


Pillow Talk

by jellybeanforest



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Beauty and the Beast, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Bisexuality, Cap-Ironman Kinkmeme Prompt, Comedy, Crackfic Written Straight, Depression, Divorce, Divorced Steve Rogers, Dream Sharing, Falling In Love, Lucid Dreaming, M/M, Minor Bucky Barnes/Natasha Romanov, Minor Michelle Jones/Peter Parker, Past Peggy Carter/Steve Rogers, Past Sunset Bain/Tony Stark - Freeform, Sort Of, Tony Stark is an Asshole, Tony-centric, Unemployed Steve Rogers, Unintentional Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-08-20 09:01:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 35,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20225242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jellybeanforest/pseuds/jellybeanforest
Summary: Billionaire playboy Tony Stark pisses off his latest one-night-stand, who threatens to turn him into a Beast until he learns humility and compassion for his fellow man. Tony can already visualize Pepper’s disapproving glare as she’s forced to add yet another person to the security watch list. It figures he would eventually stick his dick in bonafide crazy.“Is that really the best you got?” he scoffs. “That would be utterly unoriginal. Uninspired even.” He has already seen that movie and the remake.…Maybe Tony should learn when to keep his mouth shut.Or: A spurned lover turns Tony into a mattress.Based on a Cap-Ironman Kinkmeme Prompt.





	1. Scoundrel

**Author's Note:**

> I am more familiar with the MCU, but I did borrow a character, Sunset Bain, from the comics. I haven’t actually read the comics so most of her characterization is based on fic I’ve read. There is some Sunset Bain/Tony Stark at the very beginning to show his evolution into the callous playboy he is at the beginning of canon. The main story of the fic occurs three years prior to Afghanistan. So, Pepper is Tony’s personal assistant, and Tony is on relatively good terms with Obadiah Stane. Steve (when he shows up) is a regular un-enhanced army vet who is approximately seven years younger than Tony. 
> 
> Just a warning: The first three chapters are Tony’s journey as a mattress passing through the possession of other people in a variety of situations of varying degrees of tolerable to terrible. Steve doesn’t actually show up until Chapter 4.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark crosses the wrong woman.

Tony is eighteen when he loses his heart to Sunset Bain in a game he didn’t even know he was playing.

“I saw your entry at the Robot Competition and Exhibition a few years back. The robotic claw machine?” she had told him at a party he was both too young and too old to attend, having long grown bored of beer and graduated to more expensive pastimes.

It’s an old line, one that many have used to try to befriend Tony. Show an interest in the robot he built as a child prodigy (and reportedly still kept in his apartment as a special favorite) and maybe he’ll get them a coveted internship at Stark Industries or for the few that were even more ambitious, the one-and-only M.R.S. Stark degree. He hadn’t fallen for that trap, but that didn’t mean he didn’t take advantage of the opportunity when it presented itself, and Sunset was quite the picture: long legs leading up to a trim waist with dark hair cascading halfway down her back. Tony may be a touch cynical, but he’s not dead.

“You liked DUM-E, did you?” he replies, wearing his trademarked Tony Stark smirk, the one he reserved for such occasions.

Sunset cants her head to the side. “He’s alright, but you had to feed all his instructions into an attached computer. Have you ever considered voice command?”

As a matter of fact, Tony had been working on a natural-language user interface that could keep up with his stream of conscious ramblings, extract necessary instructions, then suggest and execute pre-programmed actionable protocols, just so he could control his various robots and computer systems hands-free. He had been playing around with names, and thought he’d keep it simple: Just A Rather Very Intelligent System (or J.A.R.V.I.S. for short). The namesake might even inspire a droll response from old-man Jarvis back home, particularly when he hears the voice Tony picked out for his new lab-assistant-slash-robot-butler.

“Actually, I have. The spoken word has so many variables, too many to parse sometimes considering conversational flow, but I’m working out the kinks right now,” he says, his tone betraying interest.

Sunset graces him with a coy smile. “I’m sure your robust vocabulary and high rate of speech makes things difficult.” 

“Are you saying I talk too much, honey?”

“Well, you do have a lot to say and only a third of it is nonsense, so…” she takes a sip from her drink then reaches over to trace a cool line down his bicep.

***

In the morning, Tony wakes up alone, dark hickeys cascading from collar to chest in dark purple blooms and a phone number written neatly down the inside of his forearm in sharpie. By the time he makes it to the bathroom, muscles sore and aching, he’s already made up his mind. He takes her out for cheeseburgers the next night, and they talk about theoretical physics and applied mechanics until closing. She is neither intimidated nor charmed by his last name – doesn’t even ask about the latest SI news, either the new military contract SI had secured nor the stock bump that followed – instead asking his opinion on the traversability of an Einstein-Rosen bridge.

Tony settles back, propping his elbow up on a crossed arm, index finger tapping his lips in thought. He waits a beat, then: “Within the same universe or between universes?”

“Either.”

“Theoretically possible, but survivability is doubtful,” he concludes.

Sunset hums, leaning forward. “So, if you could create and stabilize one, to when and where would you travel?”

“Last night between your thighs,” Tony rattles off quickly. He takes a loud, long slurp of his soda and stares at her with intent. “I wouldn’t say no to an encore.”

Sunset insists she pay for her own cheeseburger before they head back to his off-campus apartment to do just that.

With all the certainty of youthful inexperience, Tony thinks she might be the one. The next six months solidifies the conjecture in his mind, until one night, sweaty and sated, he rolls left to look at his Sunset and murmurs, “I think I love you,” his voice husky from his last orgasm.

Sunset smiles. “I know,” she replies, cupping his cheek fondly, and Tony laughs. She’s such a nerd and perfect and definitely prettier than Han Solo could ever hope to be.

Tony is happier than he has ever been.

In retrospect, he should have been more suspicious of her motives. Though both college juniors, Sunset is three years his senior, sexy and whip-smart with a confidence that rivals his own. There could really be only one reason a woman like that would suffer the company of a spoilt trust fund baby like Tony.

“And just a little more formatting, and we’re good to go,” Tony states triumphantly from his desk, fingers running nimble over the keyboard. “Tomorrow morning, _The California Tech_ will run an article extolling MIT’s superiority on Page 2. By the time Caltech discovers the hack, it will already be distributed to prospective students during their campus preview weekend.”

“That’s so clever, Sprocket,” she effuses, approaching him from behind and lightly massaging his shoulders. “How did you manage to bypass their security?”

Tony laces his fingers behind his head and tilts his head back to look up at her upside down. “Oh you know, wasn’t too difficult, if you are a genius and know what you’re doing,” he preens, basking in her approval.

“Maybe you got lucky,” Sunset teases him, her smile so wide it crinkles her eyes. “I bet you can’t do that again.”

“You think so? Well, watch this.” He turns towards the screen, intending to cause a little harmless mayhem with the electrical grid powering Caltech’s main campus.

“That’s cheating. You’ve already hacked it. Why don’t you try a different target, one that’s more challenging than a rival college’s utilities?”

“I’m not hacking the Pentagon. Howard threatened to cut me off if I did that again. He had to pull a lot of favors to get them to drop the charges, _and_ I had to redesign their security protocols in recompense.” Tony can still hear the disappointment in his father’s voice. _You have so many talents, so much opportunity and promise, and yet you waste it all on a live rendition of WarGames?_

“How about a target you won’t get in too much trouble for hacking… _if_ you get caught?” Sunset suggests playfully. Her hands, warm and feather-light, slip down his arms then ghost over his nipple through his shirt in a circular motion. “But I’m sure you’re smart enough to make the breech undetectable.”

And like the smitten idiot he is, Tony shows her, thinking that she loved him enough not to betray his trust. He even hacks a security camera on a skyscraper several blocks over so they can watch the results: the lights in the offices of Stark Industries HQ blinking on and off in a coordinated pattern to mimic a setting sun.

Two weeks later, a team of masked men break in, bypassing SI’s security systems to steal several prototypes, and it’s not too long after that that Sunset breaks up with him.

It doesn’t take a genius to put two and two together.

“How could you?” Tony wants to rage, but his voice is broken and his body hunched and frozen, heartsick with grief over her deception. He can barely breathe.

Sunset steps into his personal space, reaching up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. Tony visibly winces.

“Aw, don’t be sore, Sprocket. We had fun, didn’t we?”

When Baintronics is incorporated a year later, unveiling a line of products transparently ripped from stolen Stark prototypes, Howard is furious. He doesn’t disown Tony, but it’s a near thing.

“Word of advice, my boy,” Obie sidles in next to a cowed and regretful Tony. “You’re a Stark. That means people will always be looking to exploit you for their own gain,” He licks his lips, considering his next words carefully. “And that goes double for women. I know it’s in your nature to be… generous with your attentions, and I’m not telling you to become a damn eunuch, but Christ, Tony, you have to be smart about it. You can have your fun sowing your wild oats; just don’t take them home.”

Tony is eighteen when he loses his heart.

Seventeen years later, he has yet to find it again.

* * *

Tony thinks her name might be Alice. He knew it seven hours ago under the hazy influence of half a bottle of scotch. Usually, he’d wake up before dawn and slip away to his workshop, leaving a little gift basket on the counter containing muffins and cut fruit, instructions for how to use his espresso machine, and the phone number to call for a private car to take his single-serving ‘dates’ anywhere they had to be that wasn’t his bedroom. Compliance was usually assured by the presence of his personal assistant, Pepper Potts.

But somewhere along the way, Tony had made a grievous miscalculation.

His arm is trapped under the strange woman. He briefly entertains the idea of chewing it off and making a break for freedom when she begins to stir. It’s too late for him now.

“Morning, sunshine,” she yawns and stretches, her face settling into a lazy smile. She reaches over to stroke his cheek, practically petting his goatee and rolls onto her side, allowing him just enough room to slip his arm out from under her. Tony barely recognizes her from the night before, but her features are pretty if a little severe, with high cheekbones and an aquiline nose. Her dirty blonde bob sticks up in the back where it had pressed against the pillows.

“Morning,” he replies, flipping up his comforter to extricate himself from his bed and this situation. His head reels and pounds, his tongue feels cottony dry in his mouth, and (probably unrelated) his ass is more tender than it has any right to be considering his bed partner is a woman this time. He’s getting too old for this, but that fact isn’t stopping him anytime soon. He needs a little hair of the dog. And Pepper. He strains his ear for the telltale sharp click of heels then belatedly remembers Pepper had a prior engagement this morning, one that she had reminded him about thrice in the past week: the quarterly board meeting he had definitely planned on never attending.

_Damn it._

“Come back to bed for a snuggle, lover,” the woman (Alice?) wheedles.

“I have to get up. Busy day,” Tony mumbles, stumbling towards the master bathroom for his morning ablutions and a change of clothes from the adjacent closet.

He steps out, looking smart in a three-piece charcoal suit, white shirt and dark red tie.

Alice is still in bed, knees drawn up to her chest with arms loosely encircling them. “Last night was amazing, and I was wondering–”

Really, this is why he has Pepper walk out his one night stands. Well, okay, maybe not for this exact reason, but for the second time this morning, Tony wishes Pepper hadn’t needed to attend the quarterly board meeting in his stead. What he really needs to do is hire a personal assistant for his indispensable personal assistant. Or promote her. Pepper deserves it. She is capable of so much more than picking up dry cleaning and making awkward small talk with his conquests over breakfast the morning after. Hell, she practically ran Stark Industries as it was. He’ll get right on that.

After he deals with Alice.

She’s still talking, floating tentative plans for a second date. She might as well have decided they were going to have three children named Prentice, Spencer, and Beauregard. Tony has to put a stop to this.

“Honey, it’s been lovely, but I really have to get going. Come along; I’ll ride the elevator down with you.” He’ll just walk her to his private lift – ladies first – then pretend he forgot his phone in the bathroom and lean in to push the button for the ground floor. _You go on ahead, don’t wait up for me,_ he imagines saying, excusing himself from what was going to be an awkward 2.3 minutes in an enclosed space with a women he had lost all interest in once he achieved orgasm.

_That’s it: Run. Like a coward,_ a little voice whispers. _No, like a normal person averse to difficult conversations with people he just stuck his dick in,_ he counters. He remembers the ache in his ass. _Or who stuck any one of his fun little toys in him. Same difference._

“You’re never going to call me again, are you?” Alice challenges him, her tone edged in anger.

“Ah Honey–”

“That’s the third time you haven’t used my name. It’s always honey or darling. Do you even remember it?”

“Of course I do… Alice?”

It’s clearly not Alice.

Not-Alice thins her eyes at Tony, her mouth taking on a decidedly downward tilt as she holds the sheet over her chest.

Tony throws up his hands. “Okay, I tried, but the truth of the matter is I don’t do relationships, which if you know who I am shouldn’t come as a surprise. If you don’t, allow me to introduce myself: Tony Stark. Genius. Philanthropist. Notorious _playboy_. That ringing any bells? Consider me a voucher for the best ride in town. One per guest, and you have to get off onto the platform at the end of your turn. Now, there’s a car waiting for you downstairs. It will drive you anywhere you want. You don’t have to take it, but you can’t stay here.”

“You are a scoundrel.” She drops her feet over the side of the bed, reaching for her clothes and pulling them on with more force than is necessary.

“Never pretended to be anything else.”

She looks at Tony over her shoulder, absently smoothing out her dress over her legs. “I should turn you into the Beast you are until you learn how to love and have that person love you in return. Maybe then you will learn humility and compassion for your fellow man.”

He chuckles, faintly amused at the odd threat. “Alright honey.”

“I should, and I will.” She’s rifling through her trench Tony had peeled off the night before and left on the floor next to the bed. She’s muttering to herself now, words Tony can’t hope to decipher from this distance, but they sound foreign and the pacing even, almost tantric.

Not-Alice is a loon. He can already visualize Pepper’s disapproving glare as she’s forced to add yet another person to the security watch list. It figures he would eventually stick his dick in bonafide crazy.

“A Beast, huh? Is that really the best you got?” he scoffs. “That would be utterly unoriginal. Uninspired even.” He has already seen that movie _and_ the remake.

That seems to snap her out of it. “Have it your way,” she says, suddenly pulling a knife from her coat to swiftly stab his mattress and pull towards her, tearing a large gash across its surface.

Tony takes several steps back, fumbling for the phone in his pocket to signal for help and preparing to run if she came after him, brandishing the knife. “Whoa hey now, when you pull a knife on me, that’s my cue. I’m going to have to insist you leave.”

Not-Alice is calm, her face breaking out into a Cheshire grin as she meets his frightened eye, but she doesn’t chase him, doesn’t even take so much as a single step in his direction. Unnervingly, she has the look of a satiated predator, already triumphant and in no hurry to claim her prize.

It takes less than a minute for security to stream into his bedroom, lead by Happy Hogan. They apprehend Not-Alice without incident, a guard on either side of her leading her out by the elbow. Tony gives them a wide bearth as they pass, his eyes continuing to follow her out. He almost can’t believe she was captured so easily, without incident.

“Boss, would you like to press charges?” Happy asks him, once she is halfway to the elevator doors.

Tony’s attention snaps back to his Head of Security. “No, no police, Happy. The press will have a field day, but Miss Staberella there is persona non grata in my penthouse and any other property I own. Make sure she gets logged in the system.”

Happy isn’t pleased with his decision, but he nods. “Your call.” Then he’s off as well to escort Not-Alice from the building and carry out Tony’s instructions.

Tony walks over to examine the damage and sighs. The large gash across the top is deep, slicing through several layers of padding within, the stuffing puffed out like an infected wound. Guess he has to go shopping for another mattress.

_Fan-fucking-tastic._

* * *

Left alone in the showroom per his request, Tony sits on mattress sample #9 constructed of hypoallergenic organic cotton, bouncing a bit to test springiness and durability before lying down to assess comfort. He is a busy man, and as such, normally, Tony would send Pepper to select and acquire new furniture, but beds are such personal decisions, preferences on the optimal balance between firm and soft, bounce and motion absorption, not to mention temperature, varying between individuals. His last mattress had been almost five years old and due for a change. Not-Alice had done him a favor.

_Too firm,_ Tony thinks to himself. _Maybe the memory foam…_

But that one had retained too much heat.

_Goddammit Not-Alice._

Tony sits up, swinging his legs over the side. Like most things in life, if he can’t get a satisfactory replacement off-the-rack, maybe custom-built to his own specifications is better.

Tony is considering the merits of different fabric choices when suddenly, he feels his chest clench and all the muscles of his body painfully contract, immobilizing him as he tips over, hitting mattress sample #9 before slipping off onto the floor. Panic overwhelms him. His tongue becomes dry and cottony, his throat closing tight so he can’t breathe, can’t speak nor cry out for help. There’s something thick and numbing expanding in his chest, moving from his torso out to his helplessly rigid limbs.

_Heart attack_? He thinks frantically. _Stroke?_

_Poison?_

He can’t breathe, can’t move, and his vision is going fuzzy, blackening at the edges and bleeding inward.

Ridiculous as it may be, his last desperate thought, before the dark overtakes him is: Who will break the news to DUM-E when Tony is gone?

* * *

Tony is not dead, but he wishes he was.

When he comes to, Tony is lying on the floor of the showroom next to mattress sample #9 where he had fallen. He’s completely paralyzed, unable to so much as turn his head. It’s a nightmare scenario that has plagued him since that late-night he spent binging some television show about rare medical phenomena.

_Oh no; what if this is locked-in syndrome? What if I had a brainstem stroke, and this is permanent?_

What if he spends the rest of his life fully conscious but unable to interact with the outside world outside of one-blink-for-yes, two-blinks-for-no binary communication? Could he learn to blink Morse code? Use it to relay instructions for the construction of a full-body prosthetic that would tap into his undamaged cerebral cortex and allow him to function again?

He can feel himself hyperventilating, but can’t hear his quickening breath nor the thrum of his racing heart. He puts that aside for now. He needs to calm down and think about this logically.

_How could this have happened?_

He remembers Not-Alice’s threats.

_It was poison, wasn’t it? Somehow she poisoned me last night and was only planning on giving me the antidote had I agreed to a second date._

Tony sees a salesperson walking up to him. What was his name? Bobby, right? He looks at the nametag.

_Billy, _he tries to project. _Billy, call 911. Or better yet, I’ll give you a ten thousand dollars to call my assistant, Pepper, and she can get me help and cut you a check._

Billy can’t hear him, of course. Instead, he’s picking Tony up, grunting as he turns him on his side and carries him with one hand above and below, tilted as he lifts him up off the ground. Strangely, Tony’s paralyzed body doesn’t spill over Billy’s arms like jelly, remaining stiff and straight as a board, like one of those sleepover games popular among young girls.

_Light as a feather, stiff as a board, _his mind supplies rather deliriously.

Billy carries him into the back room, then covers him in a clear body bag – _Oh God, no!_ – and stands him up, leaning him against a stack of twin mattresses propped up on their side, before walking away. That’s when Tony sees his reflection in the convex security mirror in the corner above and to the left of his location. He is not Tony Stark anymore; he is not even human.

Instead, the mirror reveals his current state as a common twin mattress, ivory and quilted across the surface, puffed slightly, the seams along the upper edge revealing him to be a pillow-top. He’s product now, bagged and tagged for sale, alongside his new inanimate peers.

Tony is hyperventiliating again, but it must be psychosomatic. He has no breath, not anymore.

Correction: Tony is dead, and this must be hell, custom-built to fit his specifications. There is no other explanation, logical or otherwise.

_Here lies the final resting place of Tony Stark. Genius. Philanthropist. Playboy. Scoundrel. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed up the original prompt, but here’s the Cap-Ironman Kinkmeme prompt in full:  
“What? You aren’t satisfied with the most comfortable mattress in the world?”  
Tony leaves the wrong woman to wake up alone and is now a mattress.  
Life is hard as a mattress, he gets sold a few times or left on the side of the curb, people fuck on top of him, and one unfortunate night some kid wet the bed.  
But then he ends up in the hands of one exhausted Steve Rogers, who doesn’t mind that Tony is a bit worse for wear and seems content to collapse on top of him and sleep or quietly read a book.  
If only he knew how Tony felt. If only Tony were human again!


	2. Monster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now a mattress, Tony is sold to the Keener family.

Tony spends the first two hours screaming and cursing, trying and failing to move, to speak, to make any one of the passing retail staff notice him, then the next two crying, begging to nobody in particular for mercy, for oblivion, for any way out of this hell he finds himself in. He can’t interact with the outside world in any meaningful capacity, doomed to suffer his own company alone for the lifespan of this mattress and then what? What of after, when he’s rotting in some landfill? He’s not certain what will happen then, if he will be able to find peace. Tony has never been one to dwell on what might happen after death, but he had had his theories.

None of them involved being reincarnated into a mattress of all things.

What kind of sick deity(s) would do such a thing? Tony is happy he was never particularly religious – a staunch agnostic, even – if this is how the powers that be got their kicks.

_I don’t know who you are, but you are an asshole,_ he thinks to anyone who may be tuning in on his extra-quilted existential crisis. _What’s next? If I’m not a good little mattress, do I come back as a garbage disposal constantly chewing up eggshells and_ – shutters – _sopping-wet cooking detritus? Will you deign to grant me my sense of taste and smell then, you sick fuck? Is that the grand plan, O fickle one?_

By the time someone returns to pluck him from the stacks, Tony has sunk into a helpless depression, resigned to an (after)life as a sentient piece of furniture to be used and eventually discarded.

_Careful with the merchandise,_ he quips blandly as the stock boy shuffles along, carrying his unwieldy frame to the back where he is loaded into a delivery truck alongside a matching box spring.

Tony regards the box spring with suspicion.

_What if…_

Well, it looks like they’re going to be bed buddies for a while yet, so he might as well make nice with the locals.

_Come here often? The name’s Tony, and you are?_ He tries, but receives no response, telepathic or otherwise. _I think I’ll call you Giovanni, or Vinny for short. _

Vinny doesn’t protest the moniker.

The truck rumbles along, gently jostling Tony against Vinny, but he doesn’t tip over, strapped down by wide straps in the back. _Where do you think we’re going? Perhaps it will be a sorority house. You know how in the movies, sorority girls always have half-naked pillow fights and practice kissing each other? Yeah… that’s fake. Real fake. I know, fifteen-year-old me was disappointed as well. Whoever it is, I hope it isn’t a teenage boy who has yet to discover the wonders of deodorant._

Tony recalls what he was like circa puberty and prays he can learn to tune out his surroundings before the hypothetical kid discovers masturbation. He does not want to add _that_ to his list of sins, inadvertent though it may be. Tony practices then, concentrating on the bump of the road as he counts sequentially by prime numbers to drown out his surroundings. He’s at 4703 by the time the truck comes to a rolling stop. The truck idles for about ten minutes – long enough for the driver to make contact with Tony’s purchaser and arrange drop off – before returning to the truck to collect Vinny first then Tony and carry him into the domicile.

When he’s lifted passed the truck doors, Tony notes that at least he’s in a respectable neighborhood, an attached home in a row of identical units. He passes who he thinks might be the patriarch of the house at the foyer and is carted upstairs to a small bedroom where a heavily pregnant woman awaits directing the delivery man to place Tony against the far wall under the window. He thinks it odd they ordered a twin for their future spawn when they really should have gone with a crib, but then a rugrat zips in as the man removes his packaging.

_Excellent_, Tony thinks wearily.

He’s probably junior’s new big-boy bed. He hopes the runt comes potty-trained.

“Harley, no jumping! It’s dangerous!” Harley’s mother admonishes the rambunctious tyke as he bounces atop Tony, much to the latter’s displeasure.

Tony is not good at guessing children’s ages. Best he can tell, the kid is anywhere from two to seven-years-old, and he just put his dirty shoes all over Tony’s plush surface. He already dislikes the kid.

Harley’s mom brushes off his surface, frowning at the mark left – _too late, lady, can’t take me back to the store now_ – then covers him with a waterproof mattress pad – _that doesn’t bode well_ – and scratchy sheets adorned with red race cars. Just the thought of those polyester fibers, too few and bare with that thread count, touching him gives Tony metaphorical hives, which is impressive considering his lack of skin.

The father enters after a period of time to install guardrails, boxing Tony in so the kid doesn’t hurt himself by rolling off during the night, then leaves Harley and his mother to get settled.

“Mommy, am I gonna have ta sleep here by myself?” Harley surveys his new room.

“It’s going to be okay, baby. I’ll leave on Nemo,” she points to a clownfish nightlight, “and we’ll be right down the hall if you need anything.”

“But what about the monsters?” He draws his feet up, peering over the edge but too afraid to look under his bed.

She smiles, smoothing out his hair, ruffling it slightly at the ends. “There are no monsters. Mommy checked before they set up the bed.”

_The New York Times would beg to disagree, _Tony tells Vinny. _They had a whole spread about me being a soulless monster a couple years back. They said I could see and mold the future to optimize personal wealth because I didn’t care about any of the people who had to live it, only offering humanitarian solutions where it could benefit SI’s reputation and bottom line._

He imagines impressed silence. _It wasn’t a completely unfair assessment,_ he admits.

* * *

The kid goes to bed early at 8:00pm, his mother tucking him in and reading him a bedtime story “Goodnight Moon” where a child says goodnight to a number of inanimate objects, ‘goodnight bed’ being a glaring omission. She turns off the lights, leaving the nightlight on and the door ajar.

Harley is squirmy for a further fifteen minutes, eventually settling into Tony before dropping off to sleep.

Tony supposes the kid’s alright… when he’s sleeping and not causing mayhem in the general vicinity. He’s about to say as much to Vinny when his consciousness is ripped from the world of Harley’s quiet bedroom to be deposited in a place colored a desaturated yellow-blue. Tony stumbles, falling to his hands and knees. The vertigo almost making him want to retch, if he had a stomach to do so anymore.

_Wait a minute._

He has hands and knees and his whole body back, clothed in the charcoal suit he had dressed in that morning, except his tie is dark mustard instead of the deep red it had been. His jacket lapel also sports a small dirt mark, which he quickly tries to dust off to no avail. Perhaps yesterday had been a result of a bad trip. Not-Alice could have dropped acid in his coffee, and it just hit him at the mattress store. He shudders to think what might have happened, what pictures or videos the paparazzi had captured while he had been vulnerable and out of his mind. He didn’t strip and run naked through the streets, that’s for sure – no way would he have been able to get all his clothes back on, mostly undisheveled, if that were the case – but then again, it’s not like a naked Tony Stark is something the internet has never seen before. Streaking is not even in the top ten worst possibilities of what could have happened…

It’s no matter; Tony is human <strike>again</strike> still. He will change when he gets home, and Pepper will just have to deal with the fallout of whatever shenanigans he got into while high as a kite for approximately 24 hours.

He looks up, head swiveling to take in his surroundings. He’s in a park, a playground, probably still somewhere in the city, and it’s no longer night, the sky bright in the daylight but tinged a lavender color instead of the customary pure blue and the grass is dusty yellow, as if the landscapers were lax in their jobs and it hadn’t rained in weeks. It had been just the end of spring, not long enough for the grass to yellow, and the texture is all wrong, feeling lush instead of thin and brittle.

It’s also unnervingly empty for a New York City playground…

Except, of course, for Harley lying asleep on a slowly turning roundabout in the center.

Tony reaches for his phone, intending to call the police to pick up the wayward child, but his Starkphone (best on the market) doesn’t have any service, so he tries to walk out towards the yellowed trees where he sees a road beyond, hoping to come across any adult or flag down a cab, but upon breaking the treeline, he has somehow looped back towards the playground, facing a sleeping Harley in the center from the other direction.

Tony startles, spinning behind him at the trees he just left, seeing the same view of road he had seen earlier. He takes off running but ends up looped back to where he originally started, once again facing Harley. Panicked, Tony tries running in different directions, but no matter where he starts, he always ends up in the same circle, the same 20-foot radius undeniably centered around one small boy.

He can’t escape.

Harley is clearly the source of whatever is happening to him, so Tony jogs up to the kid, nudging him with an insistent poke to the shoulder.

“Hey, hey kid. Harley. Wake up!” he says, now shaking the child.

Harley startles then takes one look at Tony and screams.

Tony is dropped rather suddenly back into Harley’s darkened bedroom, the feeling of displacement almost a physical fall into paralysis. The resulting vertigo makes him dizzy, and panic sets in anew as he finds he is back to his past (current?) state as an immobile mattress.

Harley is still screaming, sobbing through loud gasps of air.

Shortly after, his door bursts opens, revealing his parents crowded in the threshold. His father reaches in to switch on the light while his mother goes to Harley, sitting on Tony to envelop the child in her arms.

“I… I saw a monster!” Harley cries. “He was grabbing me. He tried to eat me!”

_Monster?_ Tony isn't looking his best after the day he’s been having, maybe even a little wild-eyed and harried in his (justifiable) terror and perhaps he shouldn’t have shook the kid so hard, but he feels Harley’s assessment is a bit harsh.

His mother is still holding Harley tight, patting his hair. “It’s okay… you just had a nightmare is all,” she shushes him. “None of it was real.”

“Can I sleep with you?” Harley asks, his large eyes shining and hopeful.

“Okay, baby.”

His father looms by the doorway, but he crosses over upon hearing his wife’s acquiescence. “Mel, we just got Harley his own bed. An adjustment period is normal.”

“He’s terrified.”

“You shouldn’t baby him.” Harley’s father pats the child’s back, drawing his attention. “Hey champ, you’re a big boy, right?”

Harley’s lip wibbles, but he nods.

“Well, big boys don’t sleep with mommy and daddy.”

“David–” Mel protests.

“I’m handling it,” he tells her before turning back to Harley. “Big boys know the monsters in their dreams aren’t real. Don’t you want to be a big boy, Harley?”

Harley pauses then nods again, but he doesn’t relinquish his hold on his mother. Tony’s stomach clenches at the familiar dynamic, but he attributes it to his indigestion caused by the entire this-isn’t-a-bad-trip-it’s-a-waking-nightmare situation.

_Wait a minute. Nightmare… Dream?_

“Tell you what? I’ll check your room and show you there aren’t any monsters here. If I find a monster, you can sleep in mommy and daddy’s bed, okay?” David is already looking around the room, making a show of opening the closet and looking under the bed and declaring both spots monster-free.

Mel looks uncertain, not wanting to leave their son, but David leads her out, wishing Harley a good night before closing the door, leaving it a couple inches ajar.

Harley curls up, trying to make himself even smaller as he buries himself under the covers. It takes him over half an hour to fall asleep again and a further half hour before it happens again.

This time, when Tony’s consciousness blinks into existence in a generic living room with Harley asleep on the couch, colors muted in the same sepia tones as before, he’s less disoriented, more patient. He waits for Harley to rouse on his own, which he does, rubbing the residual sleep from his eyes.

He jerks when he sees Tony, grabbing a throw pillow to hold in front of him for protection. “Not real. Not real. Not real,” he chants softly, eyes pinched shut and head turned as if he could make Tony disappear by willing his absence into existence.

“Sorry about earlier, kid. Just not used to this whole… thing,” Tony tries. He relaxes his shoulders, attempting to present a non-threatening aura. He doesn’t take a step towards Harley.

Harley’s eyes slit open and he peaks over at the unwanted intruder.

“I’m not a monster,” Tony says, cutting to what he believes is the source of the kid’s unease. When Harley simply stares at him, he sighs dramatically. “What’s the matter this time? I know you’re old enough to talk.”

Harley whispers, “Mommy says no talking to strangers.”

Tony gives him a small wave. “Well, my name’s Tony. Your name is Harley, and your parents are Mel and David,” he smiles. “See, we’re not strangers anymore.”

The child cocks his head to the side, considering his argument. “Okay,” he shrugs, scrambling off the couch to approach him. “Are you Daddy’s friend?”

“Yeah, sure, let’s go with that.”

“We watch cartoons?” Harley inquires, but the TV has already turned on at his suggestion, showing a mind-numbingly childish program where grown adult Australians sing to children about Fruit Salad.

“Sure thing, kid.” _Whatever happened to Sesame Street? _Tony thinks, sitting cross-legged to join Harley on the floor in front of the seemingly extra-large television.

The sounds of a hushed argument filter in from an adjoining room. Tony has a feeling that if he were to try to investigate the source, he would end up back here, with Harley. “They do that often?”

“Hmmm… trying to watch,” Harley hushes him. “You watch, too.”

It’s the most human interaction Tony has had all day.

* * *

_It’s the worst,_ Tony complains to Vinny weeks later. _Harley is four, which apparently means he always wants to watch the same programs over and over, and I’m pretty sure he’s misremembering half the words that aren’t the chorus. And don’t even get me started on _Finding Nemo._ How many times do I have to end up floating underwater chased by a goddamn megalodon or talking to a clownfish that’s fifty times bigger than it should be? I’m surprised he hasn’t run the VHS tape ragged by now. Would he even notice when the picture quality begins to suffer? I’m telling you, digital is the future, Vinny. VHS is a dinosaur on the morning of the K-T extinction event._

Vinny wisely doesn’t offer up a counter-argument (of which there are none that would be valid). It’s another reason why his company is leagues better than Harley’s, who after the initial adjustment period had became quite the little shit.

“Tony! Tony! We have ta help Dory!”

“No we do _not_,” Tony had insisted, but he was pulled into the boy’s escapade anyway, as a passive agent in the boy’s dream world.

Unlike dreams of Harley’s waking life, _Finding Nemo_ dreams are vivid blue, but all the fish (with the exception of Dory and the massive sharks as well as the black-and-white angelfish that showed up on occasion) are that weird shade of brownish-yellow. It was odd. Tony had initially assumed all dream worlds appeared sepia-tone as a rule, but _Finding Nemo_ was an anomaly.

_I’m not saying I enjoy being wet – don’t get me wrong, Vinny; damp is the worst – but it’s strange, you know. Harley never remarks on the color, whether it’s too dim or too bright. Just spit-balling here; it might be the sort of oddity you accept in dreams, like how he accepts that I don’t talk like anyone else there or how my vocabulary is much more expansive and includes words he doesn't know yet, but it looks like someone put color filters on his dream life, or it's like what a dog might see, or…_

Tony stops, wondering how he’d never considered the possibility before.

That night, Harley is dreaming of the preschool he recently started. Mrs. Rodriguez is young, pretty and slim, and she weaves between her students, commenting on their fingerpainting. Tony sits next to Harley, cramped tight in an adjoining desk, his fingers stained various shades of yellow and blue as he sketches out the schematics of a new dream-recording device.

“Very good, Tony,” Mrs. Rodriguez tells him, peering over his shoulder. “You get gold star.” She tears off a sticker from coiled ream snaked around her wrist and hands it to Tony to stick on the corner of his artwork.

She glances over at Harley. “Very very good. You get two gold star.” She tears off two stickers, and Harley positively beams.

Tony rolls his eyes. The adults in Harley’s dreams always spoke like four-year-olds, which wasn’t the least bit surprising but still remained moderately frustrating for Tony, who craved adult company, even a simple conversation that was composed of sentences longer than five preschool-age-appropriate words at a time.

“Hey Harley, buddy,” Tony says, capturing his attention. “I was just wondering… the cars on your bed?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, are they the same color as the grass outside?”

Harley’s head bobs. “Yep.”

“So you’re colorblind,” Tony says, the final piece of the puzzle slotting into place.

Harley’s head tilts to one side and his brow crinkles. “Color-what?”

“You think red and green are the same color,” Tony clarifies.

“One’s more darker.”

“No, they’re completely different. You just can’t tell because you’re colorblind.”

Harley seems to contemplate this for a moment before asking, “So… what’s red?”

“That’s impossible to answer, because you’ve never seen it.” Tony shakes his head at the thought of explaining something so intangible, but by the look on his face, Harley does not accept the limitations of the spoken word to describe colors. “Okay, well… you know how when you are out in the sun too long and you get burned? Or when the stove is hot and your mom tells you not to touch it? Red looks like how hot feels.”

“Red is hot?”

“Yeah, kid. Red is hot,” Tony repeats.

* * *

As a self-proclaimed futurist, Tony should have predicted what would happen next.

He’s arguing with Vinny on the merits of conservation in the face of the inevitable heat death of the universe due to entropy (as an industrialist, he’s against it on principle, but as a human, he likes the idea of the Earth not being a dry husk of itself in the next hundred years) when he hears clanging of falling metal followed closely by screaming and rapid footsteps.

Harley doesn’t come up for his afternoon nap. In fact, Tony doesn’t see him until bedtime, when he and his mother enter the bedroom, his hand wrapped in thick gauze.

“Mommy, I wanted to feel red,” Harley grumbles.

Waves of guilt ripple through Tony. He’s not the kid’s biggest fan, but he never wanted him to get hurt.

Mel tucks Harley in, her face markedly worried. “That’s what you said, baby, but that doesn’t explain why.”

“Tony said I can’t see color.”

Tony winces. _Monster, _he hears Harley’s voice from that first day. Perhaps the kid had a point.

“Tony isn’t real, Harley,” Mel chokes out, her voice pained, edged in ill-concealed stress. ‘Tony’ is clearly a well-worn source of conversation. She likely humored her son at first, thinking his imaginary friend innocuous, but with recent events, she had suddenly acquired a new urgency towards dispelling the delusion.

“Tony is _real_,” Harley insists. “He says red and green look diff’rent. Red is hot. Green is like blue.”

Mel’s nostrils flare. “Is Tony here right now? Can you see him?”

_Yes,_ Tony thinks. _I’m right here. Tony Stark at your service. Genius. Philanthropist. Playboy. Scoundrel. _

_Monster._

Harley shakes his head. “No. I see him at night when I sleep.”

“And he looks like those pictures you draw in class? He’s not another kid?”

“Nope. He’s real old, like Daddy. He’s like twelve,” Harley replies, with all the confidence of his four years. Mel just hugs him tight, trembling slightly. “Mommy, can you sleep with me?”

“Okay, baby. Okay.”

* * *

Tony drops into a dream world, bright in full Technicolor. He’s in an emergency room where Mel sits next to Harley on a double-wide bariatric chair, protective arm encircling his shoulder, pulling him close. His hand is still wrapped in gauze, like it had been in waking life.

“Tony!” Harley pipes up, pulling away slightly from his mother, before Tony can hide himself behind a curtain. “I see more colors now! Red and green are diff’rent!”

Tony looks nervously at Mel. If he’s seeing the full spectrum, it can only mean one thing.

She’s blanched white, staring like she’s seeing a ghost. “It can’t be,” she mutters. “Are you…?”

“The one and only.” Tony replies, rocking heel toe on his feet and nervously looking around for an exit. From prior experience, he knows it’s useless, but old habits die hard.

“What are you doing in Harley’s dreams? You’ve been missing for weeks. Is… is this some sort of sick experiment?” She rages, standing to her full height while stepping in front of Harley. “Baby, stay back,” she orders him, her tone cold as she turns back to Tony. “This better not be a- a-" she looks murderous. "an S-E-X thing.” A scalpel, large and gleaming, appears in her fist.

“…Mommy?” Harley looks from the knife up to his mother.

“What? No! God no! Of course not,” Tony raises his arms up, palms out, in a placating manner. “What kind of sick–” he looks at Harley, “–very bad man do you take me for?”

He’s pretty sure she can’t actually hurt him, but he’d rather not be eviscerated, especially not in front of the kid he’s already probably traumatized with the whole red-is-hot fiasco.

“How?” Mel doesn’t put down the scalpel, taking a couple steps towards him.

“I- I don’t know,” Tony protests. She doesn’t look convinced, so he continues with a version of the truth, “Okay, look. There was this girl – No, not like that, stop looking at me like I’m a predator – a woman. Well over legal age. At least 25. I angered her, and next thing I know, I’m… like this.”

“Why Harley? Why my son?”

“This is going to sound crazy–”

“Try me.”

“–but I’m haunting his mattress.” His palms flip upwards in a shrugging motion.

“So there is something under my bed!” Harley crows. “I knew it! I’m gonna tell Daddy!”

“…I’m going to destroy it when I wake up,” Mel hisses.

“No!” Both Harley and Tony cry out.

Fear grips Tony. If she destroys him, what will happen to his soul? Will he feel it as if she’s slicing into his own human body? Will it bleed? What will happen to him, after? “No… Look lady, it’s not my fault I’m here. I don’t want to be here, and you clearly don’t want me here–”

Harley starts to cry. “Mommy… don’t kill Tony. Don’t, Mommy. I promise I’ll be good.”

“But um… I’m not even sure destroying the mattress will work. I could end up haunting you both forever for all I know. I’ve got a plan. First, call–”

But Tony isn’t able to finish his instructions. The dream is already fading, and before he can rush through Pepper’s phone number (which neither dream participant would have been able to remember anyway once they woke up), he’s punted back into his bedridden reality, silent and unmoving once again.

Mel awakens, still lying on her side facing Harley. She strokes his hair as he stirs and sits up to stretch.

“Now green and red are same again,” he yawns out.

Mel freezes. “Harley, get up,” she says, jumping off Tony as if she was the one who had been burned. “Get out of bed.”

“Did you see him, Mommy?”

She pulls him off the bed. “Let’s go downstairs.” She hurries out, pulling her son along and slamming the door shut behind them.

_Well, that could have gone a little better,_ Tony tells Vinny.

Vinny doesn’t comment, but Tony can feel the ripples of quiet judgment wafting up from the box spring below.

_Like you could have salvaged the situation? Why do I have to do all the heavy-lifting, huh? I could have used the assist. _

Silent treatment it is then.

_Asshole._

* * *

Harley doesn’t come to bed that night, nor the night after. It’s a lonely existence, just him and Vinny, and while Tony had not been fond of Harley’s limited vocabulary and repetitive dreams featuring his favorite childish media, he finds he misses the kid, misses having someone else besides his own thoughts projected on what is (probably) just a box spring. The only respite from his quiet isolation is the low drone of muffled road noise from the window as well as indecipherable arguments from the other side of the door.

By the fourth day, Tony is praying for anyone or anything to come into his room again, to interact with him, to lie atop him for even a cat nap so he can see something beyond the white walls and colorful toys of his prison.

_Alright Vinny. My turn. I spy with my little eye something…_ he stares at the ceiling, _white._

The door opens. It’s David, leading in a couple teenagers. The young man is short but stronger than he might first appear if the subtle muscles of his forearms are anything to go by. The woman, either his girlfriend or a friend (probably the latter considering Tony is a twin mattress), is slightly taller, attractive but with a face that looks perpetually dissatisfied. She’s frowning at Tony, but he supposes that might just be her neutral expression.

“The wife insists we get rid of it. We just got it about three months back for our son. It’s in good condition – my boy ain’t a bedwetter – but… fair warning, she says it’s haunted, so if you want it, I’ll give it to you for $40. She just wants it gone.”

“What do you think, MJ?” the young man defers to his (girl)friend.

“I like furniture with history. Better for the environment and adds character… provided there are no bedbugs,” she looks over at David, he shakes his head indicating Tony is clean. “I’ll take it.”

MJ hands David two twenties as her (boy)friend hefts Tony up, removing both the race-car sheets and waterproof pad to place him in the plastic mattress cover he had unwrapped in preparation for the move.

_Looks like we’re getting new digs,_ Tony tells Vinny, ignoring the guilty twinge at leaving Harley, his sole companion for the last few months. _At least this one is probably too old for _Finding Nemo _and_ The Wiggles.

_It’s better this way,_ Tony tries to convince himself. This MJ seems reasonable. She might even be able to help him become human again, or at least be able to relay a message to Pepper, the farfetched truth of Tony’s indisposition corroborated by sharing secrets only Tony and Pepper knew with MJ. Hopefully, it will be enough to at least prompt Pepper to take an experimental nap on Tony so he can tell her in person.

By the time he’s loaded into a hatchback alongside Vinny, he’s feeling optimistic.

_I’ve got a good feeling about this. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had to look up what four-year-olds dreams are like, and apparently, it’s very much a setting with few (if any) people and tend to be very simple (like sleeping in a tub or next to a hot dog stand). As they get a little older, they imagine people and things that happen to them, but it’s more observational than acting within the setting, which doesn’t happen until age 7 or 8.


	3. War Profiteer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life as a mattress becomes more dangerous for Tony when he is purchased by college student and activist, Michelle Jones, who is not a fan of Stark Industries nor its billionaire CEO, Tony Stark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for everyone that has subscribed, kudo-ed, and commented so far! It really helps keep me motivated.
> 
> Also, as a reminder, this story takes place circa 2005-2007, in an alternate reality where SI invented smartphones a little earlier than our own timeline.

MJ and her ambiguous (boy)friend roll up to an apartment building in what has to be Brooklyn, not too far from the NYU Brooklyn Campus specifically, where Tony had once given a talk at the Tandon School of Engineering. With any luck, MJ is a prospective engineering student and a fan of SI’s groundbreaking work and educational outreach programs. Maybe she’s even a Tony Stark fan girl. That would make everything so much simpler.

The two share the burden of Tony’s weight and size between them, being careful to navigate him vertically through the door and then standing him up in the elevator.

“Where did you find this place again?” (Boy)friend inquires from the other side of Tony as he stares at the rising numbers.

“New student forum. Don’t worry, Peter; they seem cool.”

“I’m not worried. Who says I’m worried? Statistically speaking, the chances of random strangers around our age being serial killers are almost zero, practically nonexistent.”

Tony doesn’t need to see MJ to hear her eyes roll as she replies, “You watch too much _Dateline_, Mom.”

“I’m just saying Ned and I aren’t that far away, and–”

“And it’s a terrible idea to live with your boyfriend freshman year,” she finishes on his behalf.

_Called it,_ Tony tells Vinny. _You owe me twenty._

The elevator dings and sweeps open, revealing their floor. MJ is the first to exit, allowing Peter to tip Tony over so they can carry him vertically along his length.

“You wouldn’t be living with me,” Peter fumbles awkwardly, his hands beginning to sweat against Tony’s plastic cover, as they head down the hall. “Ned and I are sharing. You could bunk with Betty and Gwen. If we ever get into a fight, you’ll have the numbers advantage.”

“Funny how you assume that our friends would break along gendered lines,” she deadpans.

“No, Ned would totally take your side – he’s terrified of you – but Gwen will back me up. The tiebreaker is Betty, and she and Ned are like this.” From underneath Tony’s bulk, Peter twists his index and middle fingers together. “Unless they break up, and then she’ll still side with you because men are trash.”

They’ve reached the door, which is held open with a concrete block for move-in day. Tony can see her new roommates inside, decorating the common areas with various posters and crappy dorm décor.

_Ugh, someone brought a neon Miller Lite beer sign._

That prompted some unsavory flashbacks. It had been a while since he attended college himself, but Tony could never wash the taste of metallic horse piss from his memories.

MJ’s new housemates direct her to her room, which she apparently shared with two other young women. Emma seemed normal enough, but Sydney…

“These crystals,” she holds up a quartz at the end of a string, “will raise your natural frequency for inner peace and healing.”

Sydney is a space cadet.

Once they place Tony in the upper bunk arrangement with a desk underneath (which Tony supposes saves space at the expense of being able to actually get into bed while drunk) and MJ covers him in a mattress pad and scratchy old sheets that were already pilling in some areas – _Seriously, Vinny, good sheets are an investment_ – they leave him alone to become acquainted with their other housemates in the living room.

For his part, Tony practically vibrates with excitement. His last positive human contact was a four-year old child obsessed with _Finding Nemo_ who had no chance of convincing his parents, much less Pepper, of the truth. He could rope MJ into his plot, enticing her with his sparkling personality or if that failed, promises of cold, hard cash. After all, everyone has a price, and if her living conditions were any indication, wiping her college debt is as good a motivator as any.

He practices his pitch on Vinny, who offers no notes. It’s perfect. Flawless, even.

So, by the time MJ settles in at 2am, Tony is prepared with a business proposition during her first REM cycle: her help in exchange for a generous SI scholarship that also allowed for living expenses because what person in her right mind chose to share a three bedroom apartment with nine other people (one of whom he is sure lives on the couch with all his belongings stored in a Sterilite plastic bin).

To his annoyance, MJ doesn’t immediately turn in for the night, choosing to scroll through her (older-model) Starkphone for another forty-five minutes, hiding under her comforter so as not to disturb her roommates who were likely doing the same.

Tony is patient. Tony is reasonable. Tony will not destroy the Starkphone division of SI once he gets out of this mess.

MJ’s finger scrolls up, tapping along in an uneven rhythm.

_Data limits,_ he thinks, already calling to mind SI’s network partners. _Throttling speed once the user has reached a pre-determined limit because they’ve been on their phone too damn long._

But no… No. Tony is not that evil.

He is patient. He is reasonable.

MJ flicks her finger across the screen.

_Shut down all activity after 2am. Emergency Calls only._

Finally, after what seems like an eternity, MJ locks her phone, tucks it under her pillow, and drops off to sleep.

The feeling Tony has upon experiencing the now-familiar disconnect from his mattress form is one of blessed relief. He stands up from his relaxed lean against a building in DC, brushing off his charcoal suit, which still sports the dirt stain he had had his first day in Harley’s dream world, before looking upon the surroundings he now finds himself.

He sucks in a breath. Whereas Harley’s dreams had been relatively sparse, MJ’s is crowded. Populated with friends, with strangers, with a large faceless crowd whose features shift and smear when Tony tries to look too closely at any one of them, and in the center of it all is MJ, carrying a picketing sign generically proclaiming “Defend Human Rights” in one hand and a megaphone in the other. But now that he’s really looking, she looks… _different_ than in life, her face appearing to be a mirror of itself with her hair fuller than in life and parted on the opposite side.

“Excuse me,” Tony says, shouldering his way past the first faceless stranger, eyes locked on MJ. “Pardon me,” he bumps into another as individuals in the milling crowd smoothly pass by each other but bump up against him.

They’re grumbling now, the low drone of protests sharpening into more specific complaints.

“It’s Tony Stark,” one of them says.

“The Merchant of Death,” whispers another.

He’s through now, reaching out to catch MJ’s sleeve and her attention. “MJ, I am–”

But his introduction sticks in his throat. She turns, her face greeting him with a displeased glare as she snatches her arm back as if burned.

“A war profiteer,” she finishes.

The shadows shift as the sky fills with clouds and the surrounding buildings grow, stretch, and remold themselves to resemble an amalgamation of Queens and DC. In the background, the capitol building stands white and pristine against a backdrop of overhead subway bridges and mismatched weathered boxy structures.

Tony is suddenly all too aware that though they may look different, both Harley and MJ’s dreams contain only a single real person beside Tony. She looks at him, the disgust in her face magnified a hundred-fold throughout the crowd – the mob – closing in on him. She holds up her sign, which now reads: WE WON’T FIGHT ANOTHER RICH MAN’S WAR!

He stumbles back, only to be shoved forward and held up to scrutiny of the populace as the focus of their ire. He’s Tony Stark. Genius. Philanthropist. Playboy. Scoundrel. Monster.

War Profiteer.

The bane of every too-young idealistic anti-war and environmental activist with stars in their eyes and a chip on their shoulder.

_Oh no._

This is worse than Harley. Far worse. MJ is a bleeding-heart activist in her first year of college, and he has just stepped into her world.

Tony is so fucked.

He is not sure which of them starts it – he’s fairly certain it doesn’t matter anyway; they’re all MJ – but Tony is pushed to the ground, a kick delivered sharp and painful against his left kidney just as his consciousness lurches, suddenly depositing him back into his mattress state, a startled MJ unclenching the blanket to rub the remnants of her dream taking down the 1% from her eyes.

She checks the time: 4:57AM – much too early to get up – then tries to settle back for another attempt at restful shut-eye.

_I can’t go back there, Vinny. I was wrong. She’s a hippie, a psychotic tree-hugging hippie,_ he spits out._ You ever try to reason with a college freshman? Impossible! They always think they know everything. I was a freshman once, and I was absolutely insufferable._

Vinny doesn’t even offer him the decency of a disingenuous retort. No ‘you weren’t that bad, Tony,’ or even a sympathetic if generic ‘kids these days.’

Nothing.

_Some friend you are. I thought we were in this together._

He can feel MJ settle, a precursor to his inevitable transportation. Tony tries to hold onto his present state, not wanting to return to the mob if a beat-down is what’s awaiting him, but he is unable to stop his slide back into her dreams. He curls up small and steels himself for the blows he is sure are coming.

“Uh, sir… you’re next,” a kind voice tells him, hand unexpectedly gentle on his shoulder.

Tony hazards a peak from the safety of his folded arms, only to see an owlish smeary-faced grandmother staring down at him, concern alighting her blurred brow. He blinks, taking his surroundings to note he is no longer in DC-Queens but in a bank. There’s a teller behind the glass, waiting patiently for Tony to take his turn.

“No, that’s okay, you go on ahead,” he waves the elderly woman forward. It’s not like he has any real business to conduct in Dreamland. He’s looking around for a place to hide and wait out MJ’s dream errands when the woman of the hour waltzes in. She’s disguised, but he would recognize her anywhere, with her voluminous hair and the fact her persona is more firmly-defined than those around her. She enters with a small cohort of three similarly darkly-dressed students, all wearing Halloween masks of President George W Bush.

_Oh fuck,_ Tony thinks seconds before she sweeps back her trench, revealing a shotgun she then brandishes. “Everyone on the ground!” she cries out as people scream and drop face down on the floor. Tony is a touch too slow, much too shell-shocked by the turn of events.

“You, down!” One of her co-conspirators screams, stepping towards Tony, who scrambles to obey. Hands up, he drops first to one knee then the other before attempting to lay down.

“Wait!” Another says, staying the original with a hand on his upper arm. “Isn’t that Tony Stark?”

Tony stills, trying to hide his face in his shoulder while keeping his hands in view.

With co-conspirator #1 covering him, MJ and co-conspirator #2 stride over to him, roughly pulling him up to his feet.

“I don’t want any trouble,” Tony says slowly.

“Shut up,” co-conspirator #2 orders before suggesting, “We should take him with us as a hostage. The corporate fat cats at SI won’t want to lose their Golden Goose.”

“Alright, but remember our prime directive,” she agrees as they push their way into the back offices of the bank.

Co-conspirator #2 leads Tony towards the bank vault in back. It’s cartoonishly large, with an oversized spoke handle that co-conspirator #3 has already armed with plastic explosives. They stand back as it sparks then burns open to reveal stacks of cages, towering thirty tall and ten deep, each cage smaller than a standard sheet of paper and stuffed full to bursting with a mottled-feather chicken pecked mangy and nearly naked by its too-close neighbors. The chickens cluck miserably, unable to move, much less turn in their claustrophobic cages, the ones on top releasing droppings on the unfortunate souls below.

MJ and her team spring forward, using large wire clippers to cut through the locks containing the poor creatures, who fly out the front doors, seemingly fully feathered now that freedom is near. A few bowl into a confused Tony, who sputters, trying to spit out feathers from his mouth while protecting his face from further living projectiles.

Co-conspirator #2 is back on him, manhandling him towards a terminal where MJ is typing, the UI showing nonsensical code.

“What are you doing?” Tony can’t help but ask.

“Clearing mortgage debt,” she replies. “No one should have to become homeless due to predatory loans, not that you would understand crushing debt.”

Tony doesn’t, not really, but that has never stopped him from arguing the point.

<strike>(Un)</strike>Fortunately, he doesn’t get the opportunity as sirens cut through the air.

“Shit! We got to move,” Co-conspirator #1 takes the lead, muscling Tony back towards the emergency exit, but he’s unable to push him any further as MJ still has not moved from her terminal. Tony gazes through the windows, seeing only black nothingness where MJ has yet to dream up the next scene.

“I’m almost done,” she shouts back.

“Now!” Co-conspirator #3 pulls at her sleeve and is gunned down immediately by cops swarming the room. There’s a blaring ring then Tony is shunted back into his mattress form almost immediately, before bullets can rip through MJ herself.

MJ wakes with a start then reaches under her pillow to shut off her phone alarm, yawning and rubbing the sleep from her eyes before scaling down the ladder to start the day.

_I can’t tell her I’m her mattress,Vinny, _Tony is almost hysterical._ She doesn’t value law or order or even money. She and her friends will cut me up, burn me in a hobo drum fire, and call it a win for the little guy if they knew._

The second night doesn’t go much better.

He comes to on the floor, huddled in a ball.

“Hey, get up and get a move-on; some of us are trying to eat this century,” a gruff voice cuts through the low-din of cutlery and conversation. There’s a boot prodding him now, prompting Tony to open his eyes and take in his surroundings.

He’s in a soup kitchen.

“Hey, aren’t you…”

And that is how a simple dream centering around an act of charity turns into a riot against the concept of billionaires in a nation where millions are homeless and starve, ending with Tony about to be strung up and burned in living effigy of the embodiment of American excess.

_I have a theory,_ Tony tells Vinny three days later. _I think it’s my presence that’s throwing everything off. I’m a foreign contagion that her subconscious is trying to contain, rationalize, and exterminate. I’m not supposed to be here, and unlike Harley, MJ can tell. _

Vinny is stunned silent, shocked by Tony’s sheer genius, most likely.

_So, the trick is to convince her subconscious I am not a threat somehow… _

It is unsuccessful.

That night, MJ dreams of Stark Industries going bankrupt due to a slew of OSHA violations, all his assets sold off to pay the penalty fees, and Tony himself thrown into prison for any number of white-collar crimes. It’s not even the good minimum-security prison either. He’s pretty sure he saw this type of facility on a documentary about Death Row. His only lawyer is MJ, hair slicked back into a no-nonsense bun and wearing a smart-looking pair of horn-rimmed glasses. She flubs all his appeals. Probably on purpose.

Tony had never thought he’d find himself missing the simplicity and sparsity of a _Finding Nemo_ dream. He’d take cartoon sharks over lawyers any day.

And so it is that by the tenth night, he feels like a hunted man, unable to stray more than half a block from his pursuer at all times, always at risk for being recognized as the greedy opportunist MJ is so certain he is (not that she’s wrong, but did they have to re-enact scenes from _The Most Dangerous Game_ every night).

He braces himself for another nightmare scenario. Perhaps she’ll just skip the public humiliation and go straight for the thumbscrews, maybe stretch him on the rack a little to get him all limbered up for the final denouement.

Instead, he’s catapulted directly into high school, sitting in the back of a classroom with his knees scrunched under a too-small desk. At the front, MJ stands frozen, having forgotten to prepare for her presentation.

She has also forgotten her pants.

And she’s just now realizing it as the entire classroom's whispers erupt into full-throated laughs. She tugs at her shirt, trying to pull it down to cover her bright pink underwear.

The classroom falls silent once again when Tony pushes out of his seat, causing the chair to screech as he rises, stalks up to the front, and offers her his charcoal suit jacket, while averting his eyes from her partial nudity.

“…Thanks,” she says as she pulls it on and buttons the front for cover.

“No problem, kid,” Tony still doesn’t look at her, turning to examine the others, noting the more defined faces of the students facing them. They are clearly people she knew in her real life. “Anxiety dreams are the worst, aren’t they? No matter how old you get, you’ll always have these. High school is the gift that keeps on giving.”

“It was the worst, wasn’t it?” MJ commiserates as the scene shifts to the cement quad outside the Tandon School of Engineering, blurred students milling about.

Tony whistles low. “A future engineer, huh? I thought you’d be attending the CUSP or Steinhardt, majoring in education or social justice or something,” he says, rolling heel to toe then back as he looks through the glass façade at the stacked white staircase. “You seem like the type.”

MJ gives him a one-shoulder shrug. “Hidden depths, man.”

“The name’s Tony, by the way,” he sticks out a hand for a shake.

MJ only stares at it. “I know who you are.”

The students around them slow, turning their heads to whisper, the voices growing louder, threatening to overrun him.

“Is that–”

“Yes, it must be.”

“No way, but he’s–”

“Are we really going to do this again?” Tony asks, partially resigned. “As much fun as it has been to be drawn and quartered, tarred and feathered, prosecuted and found guilty, all night every night, can’t we just mix it up a little and get a cheeseburger this time? I think there’s a decent one in the Student Union. At least there was last time I was here.”

There’s a disorienting shift as Tony finds himself sitting across from MJ in a booth, a burger and fries placed in front of him.

“Thank you,” Tony says, grasping the burger in both hands to lift it up for a bite. When was the last time he’d eaten? It had been… well, months, he wagers.

“It’s an Impossible Burger, a meat substitute made up entirely of plant proteins,” she tells him, chin resting on curled fingers. “With vegan cheese.”

Tony puts the burger back down, sliding the plate away from him in disgust and abject disappointment. 

MJ holds out her hands, palms up. “It’s good.”

“This is not a cheeseburger,” Tony insists. “It is a salad masquerading as a burger. The mere shadow of a meal comprised of lies and broken promises.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re very dramatic?”

“Constantly, but it is warranted in this case.” He prods at the patty, lifting up the bun to view the monstrosity underneath. “You are trying to poison me.”

“It’s better for the environment and tastes almost exactly the same.”

“It doesn’t taste anywhere near the same, and you know it.”

It is the beginning of a tolerable acquaintanceship.

* * *

Tony leans over towards MJ while she holds up a protest sign at a rally. “You know China will never actually ‘Free Tibet,’ right?”

“Not with that attitude, they won’t,” she hushes him then waves her sign higher.

* * *

“All I’m saying is that composting is the future. There’s a lot of usable waste rotting in landfills that we can put to good use replenishing nutrients in the soil,” MJ tells him when they’re sorting trash one night.

“Yeah, but to require composting in the city? What are you going to do if they don’t play ball? Fine people who don’t compost?” Tony chuckles. “Take it from me, a billionaire: from my point of view, a fine is only a fee you must pay to do whatever you want. You think you can’t park in a no-parking zone? Wrong. The no-parking zone costs $349 to park your car.”

“…Sometimes I hate when you make sense.”

“Welcome to the club, kid.”

* * *

Now that they are on less-antagonistic terms, Tony doesn’t know what MJ would do if he were to divulge his current predicament. She doesn't know the Tony Stark is literally her mattress.

And he will never tell her.

Because it doesn’t matter how much he grows to like her. The fact remains she is not his friend. They are on opposite sides of the ideological spectrum, destined to always be at odds, never finding common ground. There will always be Tony on the side of rationality and realistic self-interest, and MJ on the side of anarchy and impossible pipe dreams.

“What do you think of taxing gains over ten million dollars at a tax rate of 70% instead of the effectively 15% tax rate you people currently pay. I mean, do you really even need that much? Does anyone? We could use the money to fund national healthcare or better public education like all other developed countries.”

See. Impossible.

Tony is glad of one thing, though. MJ’s living arrangement meant that sex in her room isn't feasible, and he assumes her boyfriend hosts, particularly on nights she fails to come home, and Tony is forced to make do with only Vinny for company. Still, it is preferable to the alternative.

That didn’t mean there weren’t uncomfortable dreams with which to contend.

He’s standing in the corner of another bedroom, positioned behind the half-naked participants. Based on décor, he assumes it might be MJ’s bedroom at home or possibly Peter’s current one, and MJ is sitting on her bed, kissing Beyonce with her hand dancing towards Peter’s thankfully-still-clothed erection.

“Nope. No. Absolutely NOT. You are not doing this right now,” Tony exclaims, startling the trio, who scramble to cover themselves, alternately with blankets or discarded clothing. They’re all MJ, he has to remind himself. This Peter he's seeing? MJ. Beyonce? Also MJ.

“What the… Mr. Stark? What the fuck are you doing here, man?” That comes out of Peter, but it sounds more like MJ.

“Yeah. I mean… come on. Boundaries. Ever heard of them?” Now that is MJ.

He keeps his eyes looking up, but addresses the MJ projection in the center. “I’m not the one in charge here, but I’m not going to stand around while some fifteen-year-old has a threesome right in front of me with her boyfriend and her admittedly super-sexy celebrity crush.”

“I’m eighteen.” Oh yeah, college freshman are usually eighteen. _Not all your experiences are universal, Tony,_ he reminds himself. Still…

“Like that’s much better!” Tony is not completely debauched. He has standards, and those require anyone he sees naked to be consenting and preferably old enough to have a drink without the aid of a fake ID.

“You’re not my father,” MJ argues, but she pulls her shirt back over her head.

“Thank God for small miracles.” He’s not really old enough to be her father, but it’s a near thing, and that realization makes his testicles want to climb inside his body and never emerge again. “Can you and your boyfriend put on more clothes? Don’t make me spray you with a hose like a cabal of frisky feral cats?” As he says it, the hose appears in his hands.

Peter is already reaching for his pants, pulling them on then up as he stands. “What about Beyonce?”

“Queen Bey can do whatever she wants,” he snaps, and he’s only moderately disappointed when she chooses to get dressed. “Now, how about I teach you kids poker?”

“Strip poker?” Peter says silkily, running a hand down along the row of shirt buttons, unbuttoning one with a clever twist of his fingers.

Unamused, Tony turns the hose on him, and he’s catapulted back into mattress form as MJ sits up, panting and swearing softly. She rubs her face, then hooks a leg over the edge of her bed to find the ladder down, which she scales quickly then heads out to the bathroom, possibly to wash her face, maybe to throw up a bit at having a sex fantasy that included a possible foursome with a known capitalist pig. Who knows? Tony is just glad he didn’t have to see that particular dream through.

* * *

“See you later, kid,” Tony tells MJ on her last day of Fall Semester.

“Yeah. It’s not like I can get rid of you,” she replies, but she bumps her shoulder against his nonetheless.

“Be good. Don’t drink too much eggnog or accidentally tell Peter you love him.”

“Who says I love him?”

Like the increasing frequency of dream dates unwillingly chaperoned by Tony and the flattering way Peter was presented compared to reality meant nothing.

For the first time in years, he thinks of Sunset.

“Hey, I was 18 and stupid once. It happens to the best of us.”

At least MJ didn’t have corporate secrets to accidentally divulge to Peter, and her boyfriend is unlikely to be a soulless harpy in a human skin suit anyway.

“Once? You haven’t even switched Stark Industries to solar yet,” MJ points out.

“And here I was thinking you’d be missed.”

It will be Christmas soon, and MJ and all her housemates are going home for the holidays, leaving Tony and Vinny behind to suffer in isolation for two weeks. Well, not total isolation. At least they have each other.

_Do you think Pepper, Rhodey, and Obie are still out there looking for me? Am I milk-carton famous yet?_ Tony muses three days later.

Vinny registers no opinion.

_Yeah, you’re probably right. I’m on a billboard somewhere. They’ve got hotlines for Tony Stark sightings. Rhodey has gone to Florida where someone claims to have seen me wrestling an alligator, but it only turns out to be a burly lady with a slight mustache._ He pauses. _Now, that’s not very nice of you. I am very manly. The manliest._

Really, once Tony had gotten over the existential terror of literally being a mattress, it was all rather boring.

And solitary.

…He’s going to go insane here, isn’t he?

Before he can truly gnaw on that little nugget of truth, he hears the door open. MJ must have forgotten something and come back. Returning after so long – three days! – must be tiring. Perhaps she’d be up for a quick nap?

Only, it’s not MJ.

The man is young, like he could be one of her fellow students, and he’s wearing a black jacket zipped up to his neck and a beanie. Him and his similarly-clad friend scour the room, taking stock of the items it contains before they begin to slowly clear out everything that isn’t nailed down.

Including Tony and Vinny.

_Stop! Thief!_ He tries, but he is helpless to prevent the theft.

They’re loaded into a van outside, the burglars appearing to all the world like a couple kids moving out of their apartment after finishing a semester early. Only Tony knows different. Well, Tony and Vinny.

_Wait… where’s Vinny?_

Tony looks around, taking in all his surroundings, but he and Vinny have been separated as he’s sandwiched between two other mattresses. What if he gets lost? What if they’re separated? How can he survive without Vinny’s dry wit? His stalwart nature? His quiet strength of character?

_Vinny! I’m going to find you, buddy!_ Tony calls out, but perhaps he’s muffled under too many mattresses, because his friend fails to respond.

_Vinny!_

* * *

A dime bag of some not-so-fine crystalline product.

That’s how much Tony is worth when he’s sold to the fence then traded once again only to be dragged into what might be described as a place of ill-repute (or less charitably so as a crack house) and deposited on the floor, sans his box-spring pal. His new owners don’t even grant him the small mercy of a mattress cover to protect himself from the many and varied patrons sifting through for a few hours at a time.

These transient bedfellows care even less about Tony. They trample over him in their shoes, smoke god-knows what substances, and then there's the sweat and muck… his surface accumulates more stains the first two days than he had in the prior seven months combined. It becomes apparent that this damage translates to his dream projection the first time someone naps on him, and Tony is unceremoniously transported to the Jersey Shore, his suit stained and hair and skin smeared with dirt and grime.

“Hey, dude. Aren’t you…” a much cleaner version of the man sleeping upon his surface accosts him, a group of friends hanging back and whispering behind cupped hands.

“Yeah,” Tony replies, head down as he tries to dust off his suit, but his efforts are futile.

“Can I get a picture? My sister’s not going to believe this. She’s a big fan!”

His appearance only gets worse from there, and less than a month later, he’s so shabby as to be barely recognizable to any of the junkies that rest their head upon him. He’s white noise, blending into the background of more vibrant dreamscapes, not worth much of a mention. He wonders why he couldn’t have managed such anonymity in MJ’s dreams. That would have been useful when he was being chased by pitchforks through the mean streets of Queens.

Speaking of MJ, Tony misses her. And Harley. They were good kids, and at least he knew roughly what he could expect from their dreams, could manage their day-to-day routines and subconscious selves to a certain degree. There are no such assurances in his current situation.

The worst are the strawberries.

Candie is his owner’s main supplier of sex-for-drugs, as far as Tony can tell. She’s clearly an enthusiastic fan of his merchandise. They fuck directly on Tony’s bare surface, without the benefit of sheets between himself and their sweaty bodies. He grunts atop her as he drives in, pounding her ass forcefully into Tony. It’s the second-worst threesome he’s ever been a part of, just edging out the time he got exceedingly drunk and threw–

Candie turns her head to vomit, and fails to avoid getting any on Tony.

Nope, this is officially the worst.

That doesn’t stop her dealer/lover, who barely seems phased by recent events. He pulls out, spurting his load across Candie, spraying some on Tony as well. Afterwards, Candie sits up, gets dressed, and leaves, a few hits richer than when she came (but didn’t cum – Tony laughs, a touch desperately).

It’s a deeply isolating form of helplessness to a degree Tony hadn’t thought possible, even when he had first woken up and found himself paralyzed in mattress form. To be used and abused, passed around like a communal bong. There were some regulars who took the odd nap atop him. Billy. Charlie. Mikey. Marco was a particular favorite, because he is Italian, and Tony sometimes got a nice scent memory of his Nana’s Italian cooking while he conversed with him in the man’s native tongue.

“Ha un profumo delizioso,” Tony tells him, settling down next to Marco.

He recoils from Tony, crinkling his nose at his unwashed form, “Trova un lavoro.”

Sometimes, Tony wishes Vinny were still around, but then again, if he were, they would suffer together. He hopes Vinny found someplace else, somewhere nice. Maybe a farm upstate where box springs were free to roam, and–

He gives himself a firm mental shake. That is crazy talk. Free-range box springs are not a thing. The amount of land one would need to run a humane and profitable mattress farm would be too expensive, even upstate.

Tony has long lost track of time, the days and nights running together without a regular sleep schedule, only the odd drug-induced nap, the bounce and spill of a more intimate type of drug deal, and friends crashing for a couple days to break the monotony.

Then, a stray cat wanders in and pisses on him. Mikey had sworn, done a piss-poor job of sopping up the urine, then left him out to air dry. Marco claims Tony still smells a day later, so he and Mikey carry Tony out to lean him against the dumpster for the next trash collection.

_Marco! I thought we were friends,_ Tony thinks frantically. _We bonded over our inability to fold tortellini properly. Tortellini, Marco! That’s a sacred bond._

But Marco is unmoved, abandoning him in a dirty alley to his ignoble end. Perhaps this is karma come to collect its just due. Maybe Tony deserves this, to be a left out in the cold, used and stained, for vermin to tear to pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I had this idea that people’s dream selves are more about self-perception than reality. Essentially, they look a little different. MJ has a pretty healthy self-image, so she looks mostly the same. The big change with her is what most people experience. Basically, most people are used to seeing themselves reflected in a mirror and find selfies that are oriented like how other people see them instead of mirror reversed odd and jarring to look at. This is due to the asymmetry people have in their faces. When you are looking at non-mirror images of yourself, it looks odd because the asymmetry we are used to seeing is in the wrong place.


	4. Unsalvageable

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Used, stained, and discarded, Tony despairs of ever finding another owner. As luck would have it, he’s picked up by unemployed veteran and prolific dumpster diver, Steve Rogers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Steve lives in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn, which is one of the most dangerous low income areas of NYC that has not undergone re-gentrification. Specifically, he lives across from Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center, which has a 24 hour emergency room. I don’t know if there are any slummy studios across the street from this real-life hospital, but I moved across the street from a hospital in a lower-income area after the break-up of my 9-year relationship, and the ambulance’s red lights streaming in through the windows could be disruptive at night but the worst was the helicopter noise. Anyways, I used my experience to write a more convincing shitty post-divorce bachelor pad for Steve. Enjoy!

Tony wonders whether rats and cockroaches dream, and if so, of what? The claustrophobic press of bodies, the incessant shrieking of hungry jaws and scratching claws burrowing deeper, deeper, deeper, deeper, bursting through a rotted corpse? His rotted corpse? An inverted mirror world of feeling himself excavating his own deteriorating body… Will that be his final coherent experience before Tony finally goes insane?

It’s times like these he really misses Vinny. Vinny would have understood his fear, soothed his nerves even as they barreled towards a grisly demise. But Vinny is gone, lost somewhere between a college apartment and the junkie haven from which Tony had just been evicted. Will they be reunited again in the scrap heap, stuck together by a mortar of congealed rotted vegetation and wet phonebooks, never to be parted again? The chances of that occurring are astronomical, he knows, but it’s a nice thought, a modicum of comfort in his bleak sojourn to his final destination.

Preoccupied by his despair, his loneliness, Tony is caught off guard by a pair of large hands, lifting him from his lean against the dumpster.

He refocuses on the present to take in his new potential owner as he dusts off Tony, peering over him with an appraising (but clearly not very discerning) gaze. Tony can’t help but stare back in surprise.

The man is handsome, tall and well-built, with a chiseled jaw line and dirty blond hair finger-combed and tousled. If Tony had been human, he might have invited the man back to his place on the thinnest of pretexts for a roll in the sheets. He looks like he could lift human Tony with little trouble, and that sort of thing is always a good time. However, circumstances being what they are, Tony is currently comprised of quilted fabric, wire, and what he suspected might be heavy-duty foam, and he is completely mute. Ergo, he has no chance of charming the stud currently manhandling him.

These facts don’t stop his internal monologue.

_Your place or mine?_ He imagines himself asking, but the answer is self-evident. Mr. Large Hands is already carting him off to his humble abode on what has to be the fifth floor of an adjacent building with no elevator (_Was that even legal?_) for what was likely to be some G-rated bedtime fun, considering Tony’s size. Based on his recent string of bad luck, the man had probably acquired him as a replacement for the bed Little Timmy, his budding serial killer son, had slashed in a fit of rage.

He can see it now. Cause of Death: Murdered by a sociopathic kindergartener.

And so ends the life of one Tony Stark. Genius. Philanthropist. Playboy. Scoundrel. Monster. War Profiteer.

All in all, a crummy excuse for a man and an even crummier mattress. Seriously, he wasn’t even memory foam. Gifting him in his current state to a kid must constitute child abuse.

Having rounded the fifth floor stair case, Father-of-the-Year lifts him up and walks down the short darkened hallway, stopping in front of his unit. He puts him down and fiddles with the door – _God, he didn’t even bother locking it. What if Little Timmy got out and murdered a kitten?_ – before it swings open, revealing a… huh, this must be the parlor room. Tony didn’t know apartments in Brownsville had parlor rooms to receive guests.

Maybe-Daddy proceeds to angle Tony through the door, then straightens him out as he clears the back wall of the hallway. Tony observes his new home. In the kitchen to his right, unpacking a paltry number of items into a cupboard is another man with a scruff of facial hair and long dark hair drawn up in a messy man bun. Probably The Boyfriend™. Which didn’t explain what Tony was doing here. Not that he would mind having two gorgeous men on top of him, but Tony is clearly meant for single occupancy.

Mr. Not-a-Father pushes Tony across the threshold, and Tony realizes with startling clarity, that this is not a parlor room. The room containing the currently-scowling boyfriend is _not_ a kitchen. If Tony is feeling generous, he would call it a kitchenette. There is a small fridge, dual hotplate, and a microwave but no oven nor is there a dishwasher. Not that Mr. Not-a-Father-But-Definitely-a-Daddy, Esq., and his disgruntled boyfriend need one as Tony can now clearly see the cupboard contains only two dishes, a single bowl, a tall thermos, and four mismatched mugs (one of which bears the wildly-inaccurate title “#1 Grandpa” in Darlin BTN font). Just beyond the kitchen is a lumpy couch covered clumsily in what looks to be a blue fitted sheet next to a set of free weights. There’s a bathroom door open to his left, through which he can see a narrow sink, chipped mirror and the rim of the toilet bowl on one side with a small corner shower across. Hell, if #1 Grandpa aimed just right, he may be able to piss into the toilet from the shower.

_Living the dream,_ Tony thinks, rather unkindly.

Of course, this hellscape is accompanied by a fitting soundtrack appropriate for its distinctive ambiance: the unmistakable low, ever-present buzz of florescent lighting joined in terrible harmony by the gurgling toilet that only stops when Steve leaves him propped up in the doorway to go jiggle the flusher. This short respite allows Tony a nice close-up of the plaster walls, pitted and cracked over semi-exposed brick. Across the way, almost lined up with the door is a single window with a third of the cheap metal blinds missing and another third bent at odd angles to prevent proper operation. It’s bad feng shui all around, but that’s the least of Tony’s concerns. The largest, most pressing of which is that what he’s seeing is literally the entire apartment for two full-grown adult humans.

“Ugh, seriously Stevie?” The Boyfriend™ seems disgusted with Tony’s presence, which is rich coming from someone who lives like _this_.

#1 Grandpa – Stevie, apparently – pauses halfway in their trek to the far left corner, looking sheepish.

“So it’s a little…” he looks up and rolls one hand, clearly searching for a charitable word to describe his curbside acquisition, “Used, but the padding is intact and no springs are poking out of it.” He shrugs, lifting Tony up the rest of the (short) distance to drop him into position.

The Boyfriend™ crosses the room in four strides to sit on the couch along the opposite wall. “Several generations of rats have likely lived and died inside that thing.”

_Hey now, the cat urine scared off Ratatouille and friends,_ Tony thinks, a little hysterically.

Stevie rolls his eyes. “I already checked it for holes.”

“It’s filthy,” The Boyfriend™ counters.

“It’s a pillow-top.”

“But it’s a twin! I know things have been tough since–”

“Bucky.”

_Ah, a name…_

“Since, well, you know,” Bucky, who is definitely not The Boyfriend™, finishes lamely. “But one day, you’re going to want to put yourself out there again, and a twin mattress screams, ‘I don’t think this dating thing is really going to work out for me.’”

“…It’s perfect.”

“Steve…” Bucky runs the fingers of his right hand over his hair, pulling loose some strands from his man-bun. Tony notes the stiffness of his left arm before recognizing it as a prosthetic up to at least his elbow, probably higher by the way he carries it. “Look, I’ll buy you a new bed. A real mattress. One that hasn’t seen at least half a dozen litters of stray cats and two near-fatal overdoses. Consider it a ‘welcome home’ gift.”

Stevie – or Steve, probably Steve – gathers a spray bottle and powdered enzymatic cleaner before walking towards the sink. “Neither of us has the money.” He adds some powder into the container then fills it up from the tap.

“I’ll find the money. I’ll pick up extra shifts at the bar. I’ll sweep hair at Bob’s barbershop. But that thing you dragged in here? It’s unsalvageable. It’s making me depressed, and I’m not even the one who has to sleep on it.”

“It’s fine. I’m fine. Save your money.” Steve returns to Tony’s side, armed with the spray bottle. He doesn’t even look in his friend’s direction, ignoring his clear disapproval.

“You could always move in with me and Nat, you know?” Bucky offers softly. “I already cleared it with her. Seriously. We have a couch, a real one that isn’t a sheet over a stack of discarded gym mats.” He pats Steve’s ‘couch’ and eyes the far corner where the fitted sheet isn’t quite stretched over enough to cover. Tony can now see the elastic hugs the edge of a mat two up from the floor, the tip sagging forlornly over the flaked plastic coating of the bottom-most ones. “You don’t have to do this alone.”

_You don’t have to live like this,_ Tony hears him plead.

Steve remains stoic, unmoved. “Thanks for the noodles and the company, Buck, but I think I should finish unpacking.”

Bucky isn’t even subtle as he surveys the tiny studio. Steve obviously owns very little, and what little there is has already been unboxed and put away with the exception of a duffle bag and suitcase spilling out of a small closet under a row of empty wire hangers and a new plastic sleeve of beige polyester-blend sheets from a generic brand popular in dorms.

Bucky doesn’t challenge his lie. “What are you doing this Monday?” he asks instead.

“I’m fine. Really.”

“I didn’t ask if you were fine. I asked if you had plans. Nat’s on a business trip in an undisclosed location – I’m thinking Eastern Europe, but you know how cagey she gets when I guess – and I’ve got the run of our place. Was thinking we could go out, you, me and Sam. Well, Sam’s got work, but it’s my day off; we can make it a night thing.”

“I don’t–”

“Okay, we stay in,” Bucky interjects quickly before Steve can cement his refusal. “Watch a bootleg and drink a couple six-packs, just like the old days. What do you say?”

“I’ll think about it,” Steve says in a voice even Tony can tell means he won’t.

But the man is relentless. “I’ll give you a call later. If you don’t pick up, I will be hurt – devastated, really – so much so that I’ll have to come over and drag you out for milkshakes to get over it.”

That seems to do it. Steve chuckles. “Alright, alright, I got it.”

Steve sees Bucky out shortly after, but his friendly, borderline-jovial façade crumbles upon engaging the lock. His shoulders slump, and he turns, leaning his back against the door as he sinks heavily to the ground, kicking his feet out in front of him and drawing one knee up. He covers his face in both hands and breathes in deep and audible, rubbing his closed eyes with the heel of his palms when his breath hitches on the exhale.

Tony is infinitely grateful when Steve manages not to cry.

After five more deep breaths in half as many minutes, Steve rolls up, staggering to a standing position then making a detour to grab a couple rubber bands from a drawer in the kitchenette before crossing the short distance to the window. He carefully folds up the horizontal blinds, trying to straighten out the crooked ones into a compact bundle that he binds with the rubber bands, locking it in the open position. Then he flips the latches and opens the window, letting in the heat of the sweltering summer day. He turns to Tony, once again brandishing the spray bottle to douse his stained fabric, concentrating on the cat urine stain at one end. It’s a cooling and somewhat soothing sensation. No one had ever cared for Tony, much less took the time to wash him since he’d been reduced to an inanimate state of being.

Steve lets the cleaner soak in for five minutes then blots the excess with a raggedy towel, pressing down on Tony in diffuse points of firm pressure Tony swears feels like the best Thai massage after going so long without a comforting touch. And he wants – okay, it had been a while; he’s only human (and temporarily a mattress) – he wants more, and lucky for him, Steve is generous and quite meticulous, leaving no spot untouched, no stain uncleaned. Tony had never thought he would feel this again, that someone would look upon him as <strike>someone</strike> something worth having, worth saving and fixing up. If he had been capable, he would have sobbed in relief.

Afterwards, Steve leaves Tony to dry a bit, finally adding a dusting of baking soda to draw out most of the remaining odor. He goes to lie on the couch but remains fidgety, eventually getting up once again to rifle through his duffle bag before pulling out some sweat pants. He removes his shoes and drops his jeans, kicking them in the general direction of the laundry basket and giving Tony an eyeful of defined thigh muscles terminating in a gorgeous ass covered by dark boxer briefs. Tony doesn’t have much time to appreciate the show as Steve quickly pulls up his sweatpants and toes on his running shoes. Then, he’s out the front door with a final click of the deadbolt sliding in place.

Steve is just going out for a run. He’ll be back later to finish whatever he needs to do to make Tony usable. Tony hopes he comes home soon. The baking soda was nice at first, but it’s beginning to get a little itchy.

* * *

Steve comes home four hours later.

Exhausted and sweating, he places his phone – an old dinosaur of a flip-phone – on the counter then pulls off his soaked T-shirt, tossing it into the laundry in one arcing throw. Tony barely has enough time to really take in the view before Steve walks directly into the bathroom for a shower, not even bothering to look in Tony’s direction.

The baking soda has long settled into his nooks and crannies. It’s no longer itchy but is still far from comfortable. Tony tries to be reasonable. Steve has already shown so much more care for his wellbeing compared to prior owners, which may have led to higher expectations, but that isn’t fair to Steve. How many people put as much time and effort into the cleaning and maintenance of their possessions as Steve? Granted, no one else had an enchanted sentient mattress with needs, but such considerations are far outside the norm that Steve’s neglect in this regard can be excused.

Tony feels slightly clammy and covered in silt, as if he had been long abandoned in a humid basement, left to collect decades of wet dust.

Well, he’s waited this long; he can wait a little longer before Steve shakes him off and wraps him in clean sheets, good as new.

* * *

_Fuck him,_ Tony rages. _Fuck him with the business end of a rusty rake._

After emerging from his shower, glistening and alluring and unfairly perfect, residual water causing his towel-dried hair to twist in comic directions, Steve had pulled on some clothes – a damn shame; if Tony had that body, he’d never wear clothes, ever – modestly shimmying them up under his towel, remaining mindful of the open window, and sauntered over to the kitchenette. Opening the fridge, Tony could just about make out the contents from his corner: a giant half-full jar of pickle spears, some random bottles of condiments, and a single beer with the six-pack ring still attached.

Steve had looked at the contents for far longer than needed considering the dearth of choice then pulled out the pickle jar and placed it on the counter. He retrieved his thermos and a large canister of protein powder from atop the fridge, spooning some of the latter into the former before running it under the tap. Finally, he picked out a bunch of pickles to put on a plate, bringing both it and the mug to the makeshift couch to quietly eat the entire monstrosity. Dessert was a gummy multivitamin, obviously needed to supplement his poor diet.

_Dinner of champions_, Tony thinks acerbically.

Steve washes up then reads from what is clearly a library book for an hour before turning off the light and falling asleep on the ‘couch.’

In the corner, Tony seethes, still covered in baking soda. He has to spend yet another night alone.

Again.

_Fuck you, Stevie._

* * *

The apartment is more of a disaster than either Steve or Tony had anticipated. It’s located directly across the street from the 24-hour emergency room of Brookdale University Hospital and Medical Center. Sirens blare at odd hours, and red lights blink and spill in through the window Steve left open for ventilation. Steve tosses and startles at the piercing woops and blaring static, coming out of sleep swinging more than once, breathing hard with feet on the floor ready for flight. Everything bleeds in flashing red around him as he tries to stop the noise and light with a firm press of pillows over his head.

It takes him forever to settle and longer still to fall asleep before the whole cycle starts over again.

_Serves him right._

* * *

Despite his less-than-ideal night, Steve proves to be an early riser, waking shortly before six to start the day with another protein shake before turning his attention back to Tony.

Presently, he is running a handheld vacuum over Tony, removing the damnable baking soda. The suction pulls softly on his external fabric like a lover lightly massaging up and down his limbs, his back and the delicate skin of his inner thighs. 

_Don’t stop, _Tony thinks, his consciousness humming with a soft haze of satisfaction. _I take back every unkind thing I’ve ever said about you. You are a saint, an angel; is your name Grace because you are amazing, darling. Never change._

Tony is metaphorically boneless by the time Steve is done. He leaves Tony alone to air out for a spell then triple-wraps him in a mattress cover, fitted sheet and top sheet, tucking the final layer into perfectly crisp hospital corners. He places the folded blanket from the couch on top, leaving it optional considering the warm summer nights.

The sheets may only be 180-thread-count poly-blend, but after the year he’d been having, they feel like 600-thread-count Egyptian cotton.

Tony could get used to this.

* * *

Steve, Tony learns, is a prolific dumpster diver. He leaves shortly after cleaning Tony and returns periodically, hefting in an old dark coffee table chipped at the corners, concentric condensation rings stained into the surface on one end, to place in front of the couch, sliding a large flat leather portfolio case from his closet underneath. Later he adds a nightstand in a lighter wood finish to place next to Tony. The fact that nothing matches doesn’t seem to bother Steve one bit, if he even notices at all. He brings in three more library books, stacking them on the coffee table next to the one he had been reading the prior night. He then returns to his closet to unpack his suitcase and duffle, hanging up an assortment of plaid button-ups, khakis and jeans.

Tony wonders whether Steve has a job, but looking at his surroundings, he supposes he does not. Though Steve has an accent native to the area, he has apparently just moved back to Brooklyn, or maybe he and his live-in girlfriend’s recent break up was not amicable, and he couldn’t find anything good when looking for his own place to live with four hours notice and most of his worldly possessions burning on the sidewalk–

Steve’s fingers brush against something in an interior pocket of the duffle bag, and his body visibly stiffens. He takes a steadying breath and unzips the pouch, dipping his fingers within to pull out a gold ring.

_Or an ex-wife–_

Steve stares at the ring for a long moment before slipping it back onto his left ring finger, twisting it nervously. His shoulders hunch over and tremble.

_With whom he’s still in love._

There’s a knock at the front door that Steve ignores, followed shortly by his phone’s ring tone. He fumbles with his pockets, trying to shut it off, but it has already betrayed his presence.

“Stevie, I know you’re in there,” Bucky’s voice carries easily through the thin walls. He’s not even shouting.

Steve grimaces. “Now’s not a good time.”

“I’ve brought lunch.” The handle jiggles. “Pepperoni and mushroom. Grease half-an-inch thick.”

“Not hungry.”

The deadbolt unlocks with a loud click, and before Steve can block the door, Bucky opens it and steps through, scrambling to keep the large pizza box balanced in one hand as he bumps into Steve.

Steve doesn’t let him get any further into the apartment, stuffing his left hand in his pocket, he places his right on the door jamb and looms over. “Damn it, Bucky! I don’t like it when you pick my locks.”

“I didn’t have to. You always keep a spare taped to the inside of your busted hall light,” Bucky tries to maneuver around him, but fails, settling on nudging the pizza on the kitchenette counter instead. “Which… that’s not very secure, you know.”

“It’s not like there’s anything in here worth stealing,” Steve points out, finally stepping aside to let him pass.

“That’s fair.” Bucky takes in the changes, all the new-old furniture and Tony in the corner. “Your place is a shithole. You should just come and live with us. There’s cable and internet. You’ll love it.” He takes down the plates and flips open the top, filling the air with cheesy goodness. He checks the fridge, noting the contents have not changed since he helped Steve move in the prior day. “And food. We have food.”

Steve grabs a plate and a slice. “I use the internet at the library,” he says, ignoring the pointed criticism. “I’ve been applying for jobs.”

Bucky rounds on him, intending to further make his case about suboptimal living conditions, when he focuses on the other man’s plate. “Oh Stevie…”

No, not the plate, the ring on the hand holding it.

Much too late, Steve curls his fingers further underneath, suddenly painfully embarrassed. “I found it in my bag, and… and well. I’m not going to lie. I was nostalgic, I guess?” It’s not a question, but his inflection is deceiving.

Bucky doesn’t say anything, but by the look on his face, he’s clearly not buying the excuse.

“It’s nothing.” Steve presses.

“You should have thrown that thing into the Thames before you left for Heathrow.”

“I- I couldn’t,” his voice falters before growing stronger, more closed off. “Eight years, Bucky. We were married eight years.”

“Which was three too long,” Bucky adds.

“But we were happy.”

“You haven’t been happy for a long time, even before the divorce. I noticed it. Nat noticed it. Sam too. And I bet all Peggy’s friends back there could see it as well. The only ones that didn’t were you two. I know you tried, tried real hard; you both did, but sometimes…”

“I love her.”

“I know, Stevie; I know, but sometimes… sometimes it’s not enough.”

* * *

Bucky stays for a couple hours after, and they (he) talks circles around Steve’s broken heart. Steve is _fine_, he insists. _Yes, I can see that,_ Bucky replies blandly, _because people who are fine board themselves up in their rooms all day staring at the walls._ However, none of the repeated sentiments and advice seems to penetrate the man’s thick skull. Steve doesn’t take off the ring, and Bucky doesn’t push the issue. The wound is too soon, too new.

Predictably, the fridge is too small for the box, so while Steve washes their plates – “Since when did you get all domestic, Stevie?” – Bucky wraps the leftover pizza in foil and promises he’ll bring groceries the following day. Steve demurs, of course, but Bucky insists, swearing that next time he really will pick the lock if and when his old friend hides his spare key in a spot that is not the same one he’s used since they were kids in east Flatbush.

The apartment is quiet without Bucky, filled with a broken man and his broken things.

As he did the day before, Steve goes out for another run, returning after a few hours to shower and eat some leftover pizza for dinner. He settles back into his couch and tries to read, but when he spends fifteen minutes open to the same page, he finally gives up. He pulls out the portfolio case from under the coffee table. Tony can tell the leather is supple and soft, worn at the handles. It’s likely the only thing of any value Steve owns, aside from the wedding ring he is too sentimental to dispose of.

He takes out a sketchbook and a basic pencil set then thinks better of it and pulls out his charcoals. He’s making broad looping strokes, relearning the different lines and techniques using the edges and flats of his charcoal. After thirty minutes, he flips back the page, and Tony barely sees the edge telling of basic shapes and swoops, warm-ups for the real sketch, he supposes.

Steve works in silence for the next hour, eyes flitting up towards Tony then back to his paper.

_Oh yes, Steve… Paint me like one of your French girls, _he’d like to say, if only to see the man flustered. Would Steve blush, then? Color remaining high in his cheeks or traveling down that strong chest to settle just above his pert nipples?

But the only sounds between them are the low buzz of florescent lights and the sporadic sirens outside. The window is closed now; however, the blinds leave much to be desired, red light filtering in through broken and missing slats to add color to the pathetic tableau.

When Steve is finished, he flips the pad towards Tony, revealing a piece in the spirit of Vincent Van Gogh’s _Bedroom at Arles_ series. It prominently features Tony in his corner and is decently executed with strong outlines and stark lighting, imbuing it with feelings of desolation and despair.

_Christ, Steve must be lonely–_

“So what do you think? Think I could be a caricature artist on Coney Island?”

_And a little crazy._

…Did he expect a response?

Because the answer would be: _No. Absolutely not. _

Pepper is the curator of his art collection. She always had a better eye for the good stuff, but in this moment, Tony _wants_.

_You’re too good for that kind of thing._ _I’ll give you enough money to ensure you don’t have to live like this. Hell, if you are as stubborn as I think you are, I’ll buy the building, bring it up to code, and charge you a dollar a month as your new landlord. It’s not charity; it’s a business proposition, an exchange of money for goods and services. My money for your goods and services. We both know you’re good with your hands._

He can already see Steve’s glare at the innuendo.

_No, not like that. Get your mind out of the gutter… _

Glare intensifies.

_Okay, but that’s only like 23% of it, so mostly pure intentions._

Perhaps Pepper will balk at the poor real estate investment, but Tony knows art when he sees it too, and that right there is the best portrait of Tony Stark, stripped bare of all epithets, he has ever laid eyes on.


	5. Discount Therapist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is his last chance to avoid the landfill, and Tony is determined not to waste it. That’s easier said than done.

Tony has to be careful – almost strategic – in how he approaches Steve. In his current condition, he will not have another chance to get this right with anyone else. What he needs to do is conduct a little reconnaissance first to assess his chances of reaching the man then formulating the best mode of attack. So, when Tony feels the familiar pull into yet another dreamscape, he doesn’t rush to meet Steve, instead taking stock of his own appearance first. His suit is a little shabby and visibly worn, but at least it’s moderately clean, Steve’s treatment of him in the waking world having helped his dream-projected self. He straightens out his tie, finger-combs his unruly hair, and figures that’s the best it’s going to get, before looking up to take in his surroundings.

He finds himself on the streets of London, overcast skies overhead and crowds of smeary-faced strangers streaming past in both directions. In the center of it all is Steve walking hand-in-hand with a dark-haired beauty Tony can only assume is his ex-wife, Peggy. Dressed to the nines with perfectly-coiffed hair and dark red lipstick, she’s gorgeous, her skin taking on an almost ethereal quality Tony suspects might be an enhancement borne of Steve’s love and longing for her.

Steve looks different as well, his presentation neater with hair gelled up and back and his clothing pressed, but the largest change is in his demeanor. He stands straighter, his face beset with an easy smile, taking years from his visage, making him look even younger than he did in life.

Tony is compelled to follow but keeps back, at least two strangers between them and himself. Still, their conversation carries quite clearly to his position, projecting much louder than if this had been real.

“Steve, hold on a second.” Peggy places a delicate finger on his cheek, looking at the tip when she pulls away. “Make a wish, honey,” she says, holding up a dark blonde eyelash to him.

Steve blows.

“What did you wish for?”

“I already have everything I could ever want right here,” he replies, kissing her on the forehead. “You’re my best gal.”

Peggy pulls away. “Your only one, I hope,” she adds, in the well-worn humor of an inside joke.

Steve shrugs. “I don’t know. Lola will always hold a special place in my heart. She is one sexy lady.”

“Your motorbike doesn’t count,” she says, tipping up to kiss the corner of his grin. “You, on the other hand, have to make way for Buddy Holiday in my affections. He was here first, and as you would say, ‘he always has my back.’”

“Hey now; if Lola doesn’t count, your service weapon definitely doesn’t count.”

“Either way, I guess it doesn’t really matter who’s first; only who is last, isn’t that right?”

“It’ll always be you and me, Peggy.”

Steve kisses her then, and she melds so easily into the curve of his body; it’s like she never left at all. In a distant way, Tony wonders what happened to them. If one or both cheated or if it came down to money or blows, but looking at the two of them, he doesn’t find any of those possibilities likely. Steve clearly had living frugally down to an art form, and he didn’t seem particularly angry at Peggy. Perhaps whatever it was, he blamed himself.

“We’re here,” she says, pulling on Steve’s arm to duck into a pub. Tony follows, finding a relatively clean and orderly establishment, warm wood polished to a shine with dark tufted leather detailing on the chairs and booths, and behind the bar is a familiar face. He takes a seat at the booth while the two sit at the bar.

“Hey Peg.” Bucky is already pouring their drinks, sliding over both with two intact arms. “The usual, Stevie?”

“Thanks, Bucky,” Steve greets him, bringing the pint up to his lips. “How’s Nat?”

“That’s classified,” he lines up another set of glasses for the next pour. “So, same old, same old.”

There’s a deep boom followed by screams and the high staccato of artillery fire from outside the pub. Tony takes cover under his table at the booth. Steve drops his drink, and pushes Peggy under the counter, covering her with his body while Bucky jumps over the bartop to crouch near them, shotgun in hand.

“Peggy, take the patrons into the back,” Bucky instructs them, taking cover behind a bar stool. “Stevie, you’re with me. We have to go!”

Peggy’s eyes are concerned but determined. “Stay safe, Steve,” she says, kissing him one last time before leaving to round up the civilians.

Tony, of course, has no choice but to follow Steve out.

The door opens on Times Square, but it’s a mishmash of memory and reality. There are skyscrapers and the characteristic famous billboards flashing over the streets (some of which are blown out with tangled wire and rubble exposed), but many of the storefronts are old-world stone buildings and cobblestone streets, reminiscent of a Eastern European village, now torn by mortar blasts. The air is thick with dust and sulfur, and bodies litter the streets as teams of American soldiers sweep through, shouting at each other and an unseen enemy.

“Look alive, soldier!” a man dressed in fatigues and a combat helmet pushes Tony forward, towards Steve and Bucky who are now similarly dressed.

“What’s happening?” Tony asks, as Steve hands him a uniform for him to wear over his suit.

“Peacekeeping mission gone south,” he replies, thumbing over his shoulder to a military tent sporting a red cross that had miraculously sprung up behind them. “We have to recover the wounded and transport them to medical.”

Steve bends down to lift a man, pulling his limp arm over his shoulder to support him. “You take the other side,” he orders.

Tony complies, and between the two of them, they shuffle him towards the tent, but when Steve lifts the flap back, the interior is a white hospital room, light streaming bright through the windows. The man they had been carrying is gone, faded away, and in the far hospital bed, hooked to a variety of machines and IV is a lone woman, thin and sallow, her hair long gone.

“Steven?” she rasps out. “Steven, come.”

Tony turns to face Steve, who is no longer wearing his fatigues, dressed instead in a white collared shirt and dark slacks, a school emblem adorning his pullover sweater. It’s an incongruous image: an adult man in his late twenties wearing what has to be a school uniform.

“Yes, Mom,” Steve replies, his voice steadier than his walk towards her. He sits on the stool to one side of the hospital bed.

“How was school?”

Steve gives her a one-shoulder shrug in response, his shoulders crouched low, looking smaller than Tony had ever seen him before. He reaches out, intertwining his fingers with her’s. “It was okay. Bucky says he’s going to enlist in the Army after graduation. Thought I’d join him. He said they pay for college, so… you know, you don’t have to worry about that. Or me. I’ll be fine.”

“Oh Steven,” she says, stroking his cheek, her voice on the verge of tears.

Tony doesn’t want to be here; he feels like he is intruding on something intensely private.

“Hey, here comes the doctor,” Steve whispers to her, looking up in Tony’s direction. “Any news?”

Tony looks down at himself. He’s wearing a white coat over his suit now, a stethoscope draped around his neck and a clipboard in hand.

“Uh…” he doesn’t know what to say, so he improvises. “No change, I’m afraid,” he replies, approaching them. It seems like the safest answer. He fidgets with the pen atop the clipboard to give his hands something to do.

“Are there any other treatment options?” Steve presses, straightening up.

“Steven,” his mother squeezes his hand in warning.

“I-” Tony tries.

“No. I’m taking her home. She’s not dying here!” Steve shouts, nearly hysterical as his mother tries to calm him _Steven Steven Steven_, but he’s not having it. “No, Mom. You’re dying. You’re going to die in this hospital surrounded by people who don’t care, and I’m going to hear about it second-hand because I will be in school reading _The Great Gatsby_ or _Madame Bovary_ or something else that doesn’t matter as much as being here with you in your last moments and letting you know that you are loved.”

“I know. I knew, even back then,” his mother says, and she’s cradling his face in hands so fragile and gentle.

Steve still breaks.

“You died,” he chokes out. “You left me alone.”

“I’m so sorry, baby. Don’t cry,” his mother says, only now it’s Peggy stroking his face, and if that isn’t some Oedipus-level shit, Tony doesn’t know what is.

“I miss you,” Steve tells her. “You were my home, my family, and I don’t know what to do now that you’re gone.”

“We were good together, weren’t we?”

“Yes.”

* * *

In the morning, Steve opens his sketchpad and spends a full two hours on a pencil study of Peggy, eyes bright and smiling, hair set in immaculate waves drawn away from her face. Tony reckons it’s a good likeness, but having only seen Peggy in the dreamscape, he supposes he doesn’t actually know. If he had learned anything from MJ’s projection of Peter, this version of Peggy is likely a bit more flattering than the original.

Steve tapes up his drawing on the wall next to Tony, takes a moment to tap the corner in thought, then sets about his day.

Bucky clocks it later when he brings the promised groceries.

“Been busy, I see.” He places the bag on the counter, opens the fridge and starts to load in items one at a time with his good arm. He clearly doesn’t approve of the new décor.

“What can I say; sometimes inspiration strikes,” Steve skirts around his judgmental friend to rifle around his cabinets, emerging with a pot.

Bucky hums, pushing back the jar of pickles to make room for the last item, a jug of milk. “Sam will stop by later, maybe around dinner after he gets off at the VA.” He closes the refrigerator, and turns to face the other man.

“It will be good to see Sam again,” Steve fills up the pot with water. “I’m making eggs. You want any?”

“Naw, that’s okay,” he declines, crossing his arms and leaning up against the fridge before segueing into what he really wanted to talk to Steve about. “You know the VA has programs… job training, education, and there’s always the GI bill. Hell, I went back after. It’s not too late for you.”

Steve turns on the stove to boil. “And do you actually use your degree?”

“That’s beside the point. I’m just saying you have options.”

“I don’t know, Bucky. I haven’t been in school in over a decade. Any sort of degree will take years, and with the cost of living here–”

“You can always stay with Nat and me and take the train to campus. We’d love to have you. Consider it an open invitation,” Bucky reiterates his offer from the day before. “Or… hey, it’s only a few nights a week, but we could use another bouncer Thursday through Saturday at the bar. It’s just checking IDs and working security, mostly tossing a couple drunks if they get too rowdy, but it pays, and you can still look for a day job. It’ll get you out of the house… maybe meet some new people. Who knows?”

Steve looks skeptical. “I don’t think I’m ready to date again.”

“No one said the d-word, but maybe it wouldn’t hurt to make a few more friends.”

That gives the man pause, his brow creasing with sudden worry. “You know you don’t have to feel obligated to take care of me. I know it can’t be fun to be around me right now, and you’re busy–”

Bucky cuts off that train of insecurity. “I don’t feel obligated to do shit. I just haven’t seen my best friend in ages, and I’m happy to have him home. Sure, I wish the circumstances were better, but I’ve missed you, you asshole,” Bucky says, rather forcefully. “And what are you doing with that water? Are you really going to make hard-boiled eggs, because I know you don’t know how to poach them, and even if you’ve learned how since that last time I’ve seen you try, you don’t own a whisk anyway.”

“It gets the job done,” Steve shrugs. “I mean, food is food, right?”

“Step away from the pot, Stevie,” Bucky orders, protectively commandeering the egg carton in the cradle of one arm. “I’m going to show you how to fry an egg. Hell, we get fancy, I’ll make an omelet. That way, if you ever get lucky in this hellhole you call home, you’ll be able to make a decent consolation breakfast the morning after. A ‘sorry-you-woke-up-in-the-slums-but-look-at-my-washboard-abs’ breakfast.”

“…Really, Bucky?” Steve sounds exasperated, as if his patience for this line of conversation has already long worn thin.

Bucky is persistent. “I’m not saying it will happen tonight, but some day. I don’t think it’s that much of a stretch to think that someone out there is willing to wake up here if it’s next to you,” he says, pointblank. “Now, about those eggs.”

* * *

Sam announces himself with a loud knock on the door, an incessant pounding that Steve apparently recognized.

“How you doing, brother?” Sam says, a bag of takeout hanging by one hand as he pulls Steve into a one-armed bear hug. “Come on, bring it in. I feel like it’s been forever.”

Steve leans into the hug. “Good to see you, too.”

He takes a peak over Steve’s shoulder at the rest of his apartment then whistles low. “You know, Bucky told me you were living like a broke college student on the verge of homelessness, but I think he might’ve undersold it.”

“Not you too.”

“Hey, I’m not judging. We’ve all lived through a mattress-on-the-floor phase. You’re just a late bloomer,” Sam says. “Anyways, I have a pile of wings with your name on it. We could just hang out in front of the TV…” he looks around, finding no television to speak of. “Or catch up. Catching up is good.”

Steve looks unimpressed – “Nice save” – but he pulls the plates out from his cupboard all the same.

Tony notes that Sam is a better listener than Bucky had been, but unfortunately for him, Steve is just as forthcoming with Sam as he had been with Bucky earlier, which is to say he doesn’t talk about anything of consequence. They talk about the Dodgers and their long-standing rivalry with the Giants, a rivalry so deeply entrenched, it survived a move by both teams across the country fifty years prior, when Steve’s father had been a child and horribly upset about the transfer. At one point, Sam even threatened Steve with a wing bone if he didn’t take back what he said about Sam’s favorite team, the Mets.

If it had been possible, Tony’s eyes would have long glazed-over by the time they had exhausted all updates and good-natured debate over stats and the possibility of a pennant. Instead, Tony is trapped, left wishing he could buy both teams and immediately disband them, if only to prevent this very occurrence from happening in the future, however slight the chances of that may be.

“So, if you ever want to talk about something other than your wildly inaccurate analysis of the effects of injuries plaguing Dodger players in the off-season on their World Series chances, I’m here,” Sam says afterwards, as Steve washes the dishes.

Steve sighs, “I’m just saying they started off shaky.”

“Yeah, and then they had a hot streak. It could happen again,” Sam counters, “but that’s not what I’m talking about. You know, when I heard about you and Peggy… I thought if anyone could make it work, it would have been you two.”

“Well, we couldn’t.”

“Yeah, I bet that was devastating, man. Divorce; it’s never easy. Just… You have people that have your back, so if you need anything…”

“You don’t have to do anything. I’m fine,” Steve insists, like the liar he is.

Sam is endlessly patient. “I know, but when you’re ready to talk, I’ll listen.”

* * *

Steve’s dreams that night feature what must have been an approximation of boot camp. Tony is in the dirt right next to him, crawling and struggling through a barbed wire obstacle course. Bucky and Sam have already made it through, and they’re shouting encouragement to Steve whose progress remains slow and especially arduous. His uniform tears and his fingers bleed as he tries to angle his too-large bulk to avoid the worst of the scrapes and tears.

Tony rolls onto his back, refusing to move any further. There’s no point, no reward for his efforts.

“Hey, don’t give up,” Steve calls out from his left.

“Why not? I’m dead already,” Tony replies. Might as well lie back, watch the dark clouds above, and pray it doesn’t rain.

But Steve insists, “We need to move.” Jerking his chin towards the men stationed at the end, he adds, “Those other guys? They’re counting on us.”

“We’re not getting through unless you have a pair of wire cutters.”

“Then you get over me.”

To Tony’s surprise, Steve lifts himself up, lunging over the wire just enough to allow Tony space to breach the knotted barbed netting and ease his way through the toughest spot of the obstacle course.

“Go!” Steve shouts through gritted teeth. Tony snaps out of it, and rushes to comply, pulling Steve up after him.

“Why’d you do that?” he asks him later when they’re on the other side, where the troops are inexplicably having a picnic.

“Sometimes, it’s about what’s good for the group,” Steve explains, stacking three burgers on his plate. “If you’re both stuck, the smart play is to lay down on the wire to let the other guy crawl over you. That way, one of you has the advantage, a chance of getting out.”

Tony grabs his own burger and hopes Steve is recalling a real cookout as opposed to whatever passes for military-grade meat. Probably ground-up horse hooves. “You thought I had a chance to get out?”

“Were you going to be the one to make the sacrifice play?” Steve asks in lieu of a real response. When Tony doesn’t answer, he cocks his head to one side and gazes pointedly at him. “That’s what I thought.”

* * *

Steve takes Bucky up on his offer of a job as a part-time bouncer. He comes home late some nights and crashes hard, dreaming of the bar with its quiet desperation and loud obnoxious drunks. Tony wonders if this is more a reflection of Steve’s state of mind than the actual atmosphere of Bucky’s bar.

* * *

Mostly Steve dreams of Peggy. They go on dates, and Steve is happy, so very happy.

They’re in a cinema, the armrest pushed up and away and Steve’s arm draped around Peggy’s shoulders.

They’re walking along a river on a grey day, the peels of Peggy’s laughter sounding like the bubbling stream.

They’re at a carnival in wet autumn, where Steve spends thirty dollars trying to win a stuffed animal for Peggy, but rifles aren’t really his style (milk bottles are, but the tiger she wants is in this booth). Peggy slaps two dollars on the counter, grabs the rifle, takes aim…

And misses the first shot.

But the next three hit the bullseye after she corrects for the crooked sight. Instead of the tiger she wants, she requests the large stuffed bear wearing an American flag bowtie and hands it to Steve. He kisses her temple, she wraps her arms around his waist, and the next minute, they’re making out like teenagers under the first blush of summer love.

Tony has to suffer through the more intimate moments as well. He tries to stay out of direct sight, in a closet or an adjacent bathroom if one is available, so he doesn’t have to watch, but he can still hear everything, even as he tries not to. The squeak of the mattress springs, the soft breathy moans and louder hitched breathing, Peggy calling Steve _Captain America_ of all things, as if his foreign nationality is a turn-on for her.

If Tony happens to get an erection sometimes (most of the time), he studiously ignores that as well.

* * *

Bucky brings Natasha a week later, presumably when she gets back from her nondescript job in Eastern Europe.

She’s emotionally-aloof, gorgeous and graceful, with a certain fluidity of movement Tony recognizes in ex-ballerinas. She is also achingly, ever-so-obviously unavailable.

Tony is immediately smitten.

“Here, I got you something on my trip.” Nat passes a plastic bag to Steve.

“Thank you, Nat, but you shouldn’t have.” Steve pulls out a white sweatshirt and holds it up to stare at the logo.

“It says I <3 NY,” Natasha clarifies unnecessarily. “I bought it at the airport when I came home.”

“You _really_ shouldn’t have.”

“At least you got a sweatshirt,” Bucky chimes in. “Nat gave me a Statue of Liberty keychain and a three minute lecture on boundaries.”

Natasha faces her boyfriend, crossing her arms. “Steve never asks about my work.”

“I just asked if you had the opportunity to brush up on your Russian,” he protests.

“Which is asking about my work.”

Sexy _and_ discrete. Yeah, she’s definitely Tony’s favorite of Steve’s friends.

Steve refolds the sweatshirt carefully, not quite looking at either of his guests. “Sometimes it’s nice to share some aspects of your life, especially when it takes you away for weeks at a time.”

Natasha turns to him. “It’s unsurprising you would back up Bucky, and yet here I stand, mildly taken aback.”

“Peggy works intelligence. I didn’t know where she was half the time either.” Steve crosses the apartment to place the gift in his closet, probably towards the back from where it will only emerge on special occasions that Nat has cause to be present at as well. “I never asked for a debrief, but it would have been nice to talk about something other than the things on my end that she missed while away, or even to know anything about the people from work we’d sometimes run into at functions.”

Nat is defensive. “It’s for your own safety you know as little as possible.”

“That’s what Peggy used to say, too.”

* * *

By the time Tony supposes it’s been a couple months, he figures it’s time. He’s done an okay job staying on the perimeter of Steve’s dreams, trying to escape attention when he can or avoid causing too much of a disturbance when he can’t. But he can’t hang around the fringes forever. The lack of human interaction alone is getting to be too much. He will likely need to bring his presence to Steve’s attention slowly, so as not to cause shock. But how to manage an introduction when literally everyone in this room is Steve? It’s quite the quandary, and one not easily solved.

He ponders this as he stands against the wall in Steve’s old living room, where Peggy is throwing a stuffy party with her work colleagues and mutual friends. The sounds are muffled then disappear into the background as other participants fade.

“Hey.”

Tony looks over to find the source of the greeting is Steve, looking business casual in khakis and a button up with sleeves rolled up to his elbows to show off his strong forearms. He happens to be staring directly and unambiguously at him.

“…Hello,” Tony replies.

“This might seem strange, but I’ve seen you before,” Steve places his hands casually on his waist and cants his head to one side, “A lot, actually.”

_So much for subtlety._ “You have?”

“Yeah, when I’m here, it all seems so clear, but when I wake up, the details fade, and I have a hard time recalling your face.”

“The name’s Tony,” Tony says, sticking out his hand for a shake.

Steve accepts the gesture. “Steve Rogers.” He has a firm handshake.

“Oh I know,” Tony replies, mildly surprised Steve is actually aware he’s dreaming, “Considering where we are, your identity is rather obvious, isn’t it?”

Steve hums. “So what are you, like my conscience or something?”

“Or something,” Tony confirms cryptically. He does not have a great track record with divulging the truth of the matter to prior owners. Steve would kick him to the curb to be hauled away by city sanitation, if he didn’t disembowel him first, dismantling him down to his wooden frame first to find the cradle of Tony’s consciousness.

Steve gives him a quick once-over from head to toe. “Huh, I thought you’d be Bucky or maybe Colonel Phillips? That man sure knew how to ride my ass about things I should be doing.”

“Kinky.”

“Not like… you know what? I’m not going to argue with myself. That’s just crazy. I’m not harboring a secret attraction for the colonel.” Behind Steve, the outline of a man broader and taller than anyone had right to be – a soldier standing stick-straight – solidifies, his wrinkled face sharpening to reveal a dour man, his mouth drawn into a perpetual frown.

Tony glances over Steve’s shoulder, taking note of the apparition and wondering how close the facsimile is to the real flesh-and-blood man. He’d be shorter, for one thing.

“So Colonel Phillips, huh? You like taking orders? That’s your thing, right?” Steve is a former soldier after all. Taking orders is practically in his job description.

Steve winces. “Not according to the colonel.”

There’s a story there, Tony knows it, and maybe in time, Steve will share the memory, but first things first: “Or maybe you like giving orders,” he ponders aloud, looking up at Steve through dark lashes. “Captain America…”

“Stop that,” Steve’s voice is unnecessarily harsh. “Only Peggy calls me that, when…”

“Stai facendo l’amore, I know. I was there. I saw. Not that I didn’t enjoy the show, but you don’t seem the type to enjoy a terzetto...” Tony pauses at Steve’s flat stare. “A ménage a trois,” he clarifies, “even when the third party isn’t really an active participant.”

Steve cants his head to the side, pausing for a bit as if trying to puzzle something out. Tony waits for the words to hit, for him to be mortified that he had subconsciously inserted another man into his most-private desires.

“…I don’t know Italian.”

Shit, Steve is not Marco.

“You got me,” Tony quickly covers. “It’s all made up gibberish, but I can’t be held responsible when you get run out of Del Posto for using any of the phrases I say, capisce?”

“I understood that one,” Steve brightens up, seemingly glossing over his initial confusion. “As for Del Posto, I don’t think it will come up anyhow. It’s not like I could afford it.”

“That’s a crying shame; I’ve got tears in my eyes at the thought, Captain Rogers – can I call you Cap?” Tony ignores Steve’s protestations, continuing, “Well, that’s it; we’re going. I’ve decided.” _If_ he ever becomes human again, that is.

Steve huffs out a breath and stuffs his hands in his pockets. When he speaks again, he sounds resigned. “What the hell; I’m going crazy, but it’s a date, increasingly-worrisome figment of my imagination.”

“Excellent. I’ll hold you to that.”

“Fantastic,” he says in a flat affect that reveals it’s anything but, “First date I’ve had in ages, and he’s my dream man. Bucky would be so proud.”

Tony graces him with one of his best smiles. “Of course he would be, assuming he is a man of taste. I’m a catch, a perfect gentleman; I won’t even try inviting you up for a drink at the end of our date. Not that you aren’t ridiculously attractive, but I don’t do straight guys, darling.”

“Straight?” Steve repeats, his mouth twisting into a frown. “I haven’t been this deep in denial since Jesus Camp in middle school.”

“…What?” Tony hadn’t seen that one coming. “Then Peggy…” He’s better at this. Tony prides himself at being able to tell. Clearly, it’s been far too long.

Steve’s tone is frank. “Well, this kind of goes without saying, considering I’m talking to myself, but Tom Jeffers, Bobby Sherman, Otto from that one time in Munich when I was on leave. I mean, it’s been a while, but I had a life before Peggy. I didn’t spring fully formed from my father’s head to marry her.”

“So… just to be clear: When you say dream man…”

“Hot, funny, smart. Also, I’m asleep right now dreaming both you and this conversation, so I think you qualify.” Steve chuckles, but there’s no mirth in it. “I’m losing my mind, but hey, at least the view is nice. I mean, you’re me so of course you’d know what I like. You sort of resemble that Fortune 500 guy on the cover of those magazines I saw a couple years back. Stark. You even call yourself his given name.”

“You recognize me?” Tony asks warily. In his experience, that rarely went well.

Steve looks away, running fingers through his hair. “What can I say? My subconscious must have expensive taste. I saw Stark and must have used him as a model for you, though I made you shorter–”

“Offended. I think I’m offended right now.”

“And older–”

“It’s been a rough year.”

Steve shrugs, thumbs hooking into his pants pockets. “I like older. Peggy was older, too. Overall, you look a bit more… human, I guess. Less of an arrogant prick than I imagine the real deal to be.”

Tony thins his mouth at him. “Thanks. Stick around long enough and maybe I’ll live down to your low expectations of me.”

“Kind of weird I’d dream up a dead man, though,” he wonders idly.

That stops Tony in his tracks. “Stark’s dead?”

“Presumed. No body, but the interim CEO was looking into getting him declared dead not too long ago. There was a lawsuit about it. I think he even fired Stark’s long-time personal assistant over it,” Steve shakes his head. “Anyway, it didn’t work. Stark hasn’t been gone long enough for that.”

Tony’s heart clenches.

_Pepper…_

“Is Stark’s PA doing okay?”

Pepper is brilliant, resourceful. She’ll be fine. And if she’s not fine, then there’ll be hell to pay when he gets out of here. _Goddammit Obie, at least wait until my body is found, cold and stiff, before showing your hand. _He’s moderately disappointed at the display of disloyalty. Taking over SI is one thing – Tony had disappeared, and someone needed to step up – but booting Pepper at first opportunity? That took a certain callousness and disregard towards what Obie had to know Tony’s wishes would have been.

“I don’t think the papers reported on it, but I hope so. I hope she had some savings to tide her over until she found a new job.”

**_If_**_ she found a new job._ Obie could hold a grudge, he remembers. When this is all over, Tony will simply beg her forgiveness with a new closet of Louboutins, Jimmy Choo, Manolo’s… Pepper is reasonable. She won’t refuse his offer of her old job back (with a hefty pay raise) out of pride, and if she does, if she decides that this is the bridge too far, then Tony himself will write her a glowing recommendation. Not his next personal assistant. Him. Using his own words.

Maybe that will coax her back.

Steve looks sympathetic in a detached way, all the main players too distant to inspire real concern. Tony tries to not hold it against him.

“She must’ve taken his disappearance hard to go against the brass like that.”

“I suppose so.” Maybe Tony will give her his black AmEx for the day and dare her to try to bankrupt him.

“Especially with the rents in Manhattan,” Steve continues. “I know I’ve been gone a while, but rent practically doubled in Brooklyn. I about near had a stroke when I looked it up. I wouldn’t have been able to afford my old apartment in Flatbush for very long.”

“Your ex really cleaned you out in the divorce, huh?” Tony commiserates. Now, this situation he understands all too well. Steve had fallen into the same trap that ensnared many in Tony’s social circle, acquaintances and business associates alike. Hell, Earl Hodgins married Wife #4 as soon as the ink dried on his divorce papers to Wife #3. Tony had long sworn that that would never be him and made himself content with sampling all the fine people of New York with no expectations of a repeat performance, much less a semi-permanent residency.

Steve frowns, his brow drawing together deep and severe. “No, Peggy wouldn’t do that to me.”

“Have you seen the match box you call your apartment?” The surroundings bleed into shades of sad and desperate as the warm living room of Steve’s past becomes his current (and inexplicably smaller) studio apartment. “Because from here, it looks like that’s exactly what she did.”

_Poor bastard is in denial._

“I don’t care if you are a manifestation of leftover doubt or bitterness or whatever. You don’t speak about her like that,” Steve’s voice is firm, an undercurrent of anger warning Tony to back off. “We split our savings, but _I_ insisted she keep our flat and our furniture and everything else. I was moving back to Brooklyn; didn’t need all that stuff from another life weighing me down. She couldn’t afford to buy me out, and it would have… it would have been hard for her if I forced her to sell it all and give me half.”

“Ah, a martyr then,” Tony presses, ignoring the threat in Steve’s tone and stance. “A martyr and an idiot.”

“Or a man who still loves his ex-wife enough not to screw her over.”

“Same thing.”

Steve is quiet then, contemplative. “I can sure be a jerk when I put my mind to it.”

“A little self-interest doesn’t make a man a jerk; it makes him smart. If you had had a little more instinct for self-preservation, you wouldn’t have to live off pickles and the kindness of friends.” _He wouldn’t have been there to save you from certain destruction either,_ a traitorous voice whispers. Tony hates that voice.

Steve has the sense to look embarrassed. “It’s not...I’m not a charity case.”

He waves towards the fridge in the kitchenette. “Oh really, and what would you call it when your buddy has to stock your fridge because all you have are condiments and a Costco-sized jar of whey – which by the way, is a byproduct of the far superior product: cheese – because you either can’t afford it due to the fact that your ex-wife still carries your balls in her purse or you simply can’t get your act together.”

“I had to uproot my entire life. I just got divorced. We’re still finalizing it through the courts.” Steve looms over him, arms crossed and fingers biting into the firm flesh of his inner elbow.

Tony simply hums. “Mm. Which happens; half of all marriages end in divorce. No need to be a pussy about it.”

That does it.

Steve drops back, his fist swinging towards the other man’s face, but just as he connects, Tony is catapulted back into mattress form to find Steve cradling his hand in surprise. Tony feels the reverb in his springs from the punch Steve had delivered to his bed and wishes it hurt more as he watches the man rise and stumble to the bathroom to splash water on his face, his shoulders vibrating with the effort to stay calm.

* * *

“What’s with you today?” Bucky asks later, when he brings over another loaf of bread, lunch meat, and lettuce, having noticed his friend running low. Steve had been snapping at him all afternoon.

“You don’t have to keep doing this,” he bristles. “I can take care of myself. I’m not your pet project, or your trainwreck friend you have to help because he’s always screwing up.”

Bucky pauses halfway through placing the lettuce in the crisper, having moved the mustard out to a more appropriate place. “That’s not what this is.”

“You’re always like this. Whenever I’ve fallen into a tough spot, you’re there to pull me out.”

“And that’s a bad thing?”

Steve squints his eyes closed, pinching the bridge of his nose and massaging the skin there. “No, no it’s not, but I want to do it myself every once in a while. I don’t need you there every step of the way, waiting to pull me out of a fight you think I can’t win, a life event you think I can’t manage, or some other disaster,” he looks up. “I’m not some charity case.”

“Of course you aren’t. You think this is why I do this? Because I feel sorry for you? I do this – all of it – because you’re my goddamn brother, Stevie, and I don’t like seeing you suffer,” Bucky says, deeply insulted with an undercurrent of hurt, “but if you don’t want my help, fine.”

“I don’t.”

He throws up his hands, turning towards the door. “Then bye. See you later. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week. I don’t know. Call me when you’re done being a dumb ass.”

The door slams shut.

* * *

Steve is perusing some London shops when Tony approaches him, looking like he’d rather be elsewhere, but things being as they are, it’s not like he can actually avoid Steve for any length of time.

“What? Were there no stray kittens to torture down an alley somewhere? I think there was a feral cat colony in Peckham a ways back, at least how I remember it,” Steve huffs, turning towards the window displaying a range of pastries.

Tony fidgets, his fingers righting his frayed tie and straightening his jacket, dusting off an arm. “I would like to… apologize. I might have been a hair out of line.”

“A hair, huh?”

“Yeah, well, you’re a nice person, Steve, a real stand-up guy, but the world loves a guy like you as long as he has something they can exploit. You can’t make it too easy for them, otherwise you’ll end up with nothing,” he advises. “You need to learn to stand up for yourself more.”

A memory, a thread of thought, shimmers into existence around them.

A runty Steve, thin and asthmatic, stands up to a much larger teen in an alley, his lip busted and eye already blackened and swollen shut, but his fists still clenched and raised. “I can do this all day,” he spits out, a touch wobbly on his feet, before he lunges. The memory fades to a modern-day Brooklyn.

Tony doesn’t know what to say about that.

“You know for someone who’s me, you sure don’t know me very well,” the Steve-as-he-is-now remarks.

So Tony rallies, lest the man become suspicious. “Just think of me like your inner Devil’s Advocate, that dissenting voice in your head that tells you that maybe you don’t have to ‘lay down on the wire’ every time. It’s not like you’re talking to anyone in your waking life–”

“I talk to people.”

“Your little dog and pony show for Sam and Bucky doesn’t count, and you think I don’t know what happened with Bucky. You’re not doing well. You’re not fine,” he taps his temple. “I should know–” _I’m not fine either; I haven’t been for a long time, if ever _“–So talk to me.” _Please._

It has been too long since he’s conversed with a half-way decent person in possession of a fully-developed frontal cortex not addled by drugs.

“So, you’re like my discount therapist?” Steve crosses his arms, looking dubious. “Should I imagine myself on a couch?”

The change in scenery and position is disorienting. One minute they’re standing on the streets of Brooklyn and the next Steve is lying on a chaise lounge with Tony falling backwards into a seat across from him in an overstuffed dark leather chair, a yellow legal notepad dropped into his lap with a pen clipped to the side.

“If that would make you more comfortable,” Tony says, though the prospect of hearing Steve drone on about his inability to move on from his ex and how that somehow stems from a lackluster relationship with his mother is not his idea of a good time. For one thing, it would mean Tony would have to be quiet for at least twenty minutes straight, no tangents or interruptions, which is frankly impossible. He doodles a preliminary schematic for a VR-enabled therapy device on the provided notepad, something to busy his hands and distract his mind from what is sure to be the standard tale of childhood neglect preceding mediocre failure. Boring. “Though we could just skip to the end. It’s your mom. They always say it’s the mom.” Which is why therapists are idiots. Tony’s mother had been a saint and look how he turned out.

Steve closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. “It’s not my mom.”

There’s a blonde woman Tony barely recognizes coming into focus behind the couch where Steve lies; she’s happy and laughing, embracing her young son. Her voice, mumbling too low for coherence, is soft and kind, like warmed syrup.

Tony pauses his scribbling and quirks a brow. “Father then?” Perhaps they had something in common.

There’s something off – stiff and flat, the color desaturated – about the man who appears next. He’s dressed in fatigues with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, a rounded helmet covering his head, drawn just above his eyes. It’s more static photograph than living memory.

“I don’t remember my dad. He died when I was a baby…” The apparition dissipates as Steve turns to face him, lifting his upper body on propped-up elbows. “Shouldn’t you know this already?”

“Don’t know. It’s your subconscious running the show; I just work here,” Tony rambles, the lie as easy to him as breathing. “Sometimes it helps to say it out loud to a strange face. Now, tell me about what happened with ‘your best girl.’”

Steve collapses back into the coach, fingers lacing together over his stomach. “Not much to tell. We married too young, and it just… well, you know how these things go sometimes.”

“No, not really,” Tony admits. He crooks his elbows to lace his fingers behind his head and leans back in his seat. “But I’ve got nowhere to be, so enlighten me.”

* * *

Steve hadn’t been lying when he said he had been too young.

His mother had passed after a sudden and aggressive illness during his senior year of high school, and with no other relatives, he had been taken in by Bucky’s family. He didn’t want to be a burden – that much hasn’t changed – and so, fresh from high school, Steve had enlisted alongside his childhood friend. Army. The 107th. A tour in Bosnia and a stint at an American army base in Germany.

And that’s where he had met Peggy Carter, British Intelligence Agent, in an off-base German pub frequented by American soldiers. Firey, intelligent and tough-as-nails with a strong jawline and that figure she cut in a sophisticated blouse and skirt number… Steve never stood a chance.

“What can I say, I’m a sucker for brunettes and the color red,” Steve had said by way of explanation. From his prone position, he lightly massages his eyes with one hand and waves absently in Tony’s direction with the other as if his mere presence is further evidence of a long-standing pattern.

Behind the couch, dark eyes glance at Tony over a crystal tumbler of scotch taken neat. When Peggy pulls away, the lip of her glass is stained a glistening dark red. That must have been how Steve saw her that night, how she had looked at him.

_I get it,_ Tony thinks, one arm across his chest to prop the other up by the elbow, chin tucked with fingers curled lightly over his mouth.

He sees the highlights of a whirlwind courtship in short vignettes: their first dance with her head cradled in the hollow of his neck, Peggy pushing Steve onto his back and confidently planting first one leg then the other on either side of him, their first playful debate over British vs. American football that somehow evolved into a real fight comparing British and American interference on the global stage, the apologies and eventual makeup…

Steve whispering _I love you_, breath hot on Peggy’s ear as he nibbled the lobe.

Perhaps it was the nature of their occupations that reminded them that death was an ever-present possibility or simply the folly of youth, but whatever the reason, within nine months, Steve had a foreign bride, an honorable discharge from Uncle Sam, and a spousal visa that would allow him to move to the UK permanently.

He had been so happy, so complete, more sure of this than of anything in his entire life–

How had it all come crashing down?

It had started small: the little compromises needed to cohabit with someone new, the terrible coffee (Steve never took to tea), the lack of fireworks on his birthday. These were easy to overcome: he and Peggy eventually fell into a rhythm complete with a chore chart and budget, Bucky periodically mailed him proper coffee beans from across the pond, and he streamed the annual Macy’s 4th of July Fireworks Spectacular at 1am the day after. It was an adjustment, but nothing earth-shattering.

But then there were the more difficult issues, the ones that seemed distantly solvable but only snowballed until they were hard to ignore: Steve’s dissatisfaction with post-army ex-pat job opportunities in London, Peggy’s missions which kept her away from home for weeks at a time, the fact that Steve left the dishes soaking in the sink until they ran out of clean ones (which explained his current minimalist approach to dishware). Even when Peggy was home, she could never tell him about her job, her coworkers, this whole other life she lived without him, and Steve never wanted to spoil their time together by bothering her with his crushing loneliness and sense of unfulfillment. The decline was slow, almost imperceptible but undeniable. They drifted apart until one day, it was too late.

The end hadn’t been a bomb. It wasn’t betrayal or infidelity or a fight that turned physical.

It had been a whisper.

After another two week assignment that had been extended a further three days, Peggy was home. Steve had gone out to collect her suitcases while Peggy had walked into the kitchen, taken one disapproving look at the sink, then rolled up her sleeves to deal with four days of dirty dishes Steve had left to ‘soak.’ After he had left her bags in the foyer, Steve approached her from behind. Stepping in close, he slipped his hands around her waist to smooth over her lower stomach and buried his nose in her hair, looking over her head at the rhythmic scrub of sponge over ceramic.

Peggy froze under his touch, and both suddenly realized how long it had been since they had stood so close. They hadn’t even had sex for months.

“It’s not working, is it?” Her tremulous voice was too soft, too quiet for all the devastation it wreaks.

Steve felt his eyes prickle, and he hugged Peggy tighter, not wanting to let her go but unable to lie to her.

“No, it’s not.”

* * *

“Steve, Steve! You still with me, buddy?” Tony is crouched down next to the couch, shaking him. “You got to calm down!” They’re both trapped in the eye of a hurricane, images swirling around them.

“Let’s try an exercise,” says the couples counselor he couldn’t open up to.

The low chatter of other couples at the restaurant highlights the silence between them on a scheduled date night.

He’s sitting across a table from Peggy, each of them talking through their lawyers. “This is ridiculous,” memory-Steve says. “Come on, Peg. I don’t even want the good china. I don’t want any of it–” He shrugs off his lawyer’s touch on his shoulder. “No, this is stupid. Why are we each paying a couple suits 250 a pop each to argue over what can’t be worth more than twenty minutes of their time?”

Ink drying on paper.

“Steve!” Tony cries.

A sense memory of the smell of Peggy’s hair the last time they embraced looms closer. The feel of her body against his.

“I love you. I’ll always love you.”

Steve jolts awake, the bedding under his face wet with tears. Eyes still blurry and mind addled with residual dreams, he reaches over, towards where Peggy used to lay in their bed back in their old flat on what feels simultaneously like yesterday and a millennium ago. He reaches and finds only bare peeling linoleum floors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In case it’s not clear, in this AU, Steve and Bucky joined the army in 1995 and were deployed to Bosnia as part of the NATO peacekeeping initiatives after a bloody civil war where the Serbians tried to ethnically cleanse the Bosniaks. Most of the early waves of American troops sent to Bosnia were stationed in American military bases in Germany, where he meets Peggy. Steve left the army after his four year contract was up to start a life with Peggy in the UK. Bucky loses his arm before his four years are up, is medically discharged, and after a lot of therapy (both physical and otherwise), goes to college on the GI bill, but he never uses his business degree. Instead he primarily works as the best one-armed bartender in New York, which is why he’s available weekdays during the day to check on Steve. Sam has a day job at the VA, so he’s generally available evenings and weekends. Steve doesn’t want to trouble his friends, but they’re there to make sure he eats and goes outside every once in a while. 
> 
> Also, Steve’s dishwashing flaw was inspired by Chris Evans openly wondering if letting the dishes sit in the sink makes him a bad man.


	6. Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve’s friends encourage him to start dating again. Meanwhile, Tony attempts to help Steve get over Peggy by taking him on dates in his dreamscape. 
> 
> “It’s for your own good,” Tony insists. “Completely platonic. No ulterior motives to see here.”
> 
> Tony is such a liar.

As promised, Bucky doesn’t stop by the next day, but Sam does.

“Did Bucky send you?” Steve asks him when he answers Sam’s characteristically-loud knock at the door, his tone weary and mildly suspicious.

“Nope. Can’t a man want to see his friend every once in a while without being asked to?” Sam replies, rolling heel-to-toe while making no move to invade Steve’s apartment. “You gonna let me in or what?”

“Are you going to ask about what happened?”

“Depends. Do you want to talk about it?”

Steve steps aside, letting Sam in. “No.”

“Then we won’t.” Sam sits on the couch while Steve rummages through the fridge, producing a couple beers. “I was actually more curious about how the rest of your life is going. You getting an employee discount on art supplies at the new job?”

Steve crosses the short distance and hands him a can. “Why? You looking to buy? We don’t work on commission if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“Like anyone wants to see my artistic rendition of stick figures and handprint turkeys,” Sam jokes, covertly glancing at Tony’s corner, where two additional drawings of Peggy have joined the original. “How do you like it? Your job?”

“Not enough hours for benefits, but between that and the bouncer gig, it pays the bills.”

Tony doubts it – he’s done the math – but who is he to contradict Steve in his current condition? The man is likely still partially living off his savings. And no benefits? If Steve gets sick or breaks something, he’s screwed.

“Coworkers nice?” Sam takes a swig of his beer.

“Nice enough,” Steve shrugs. “Marlene’s daughter just had a baby, so she’s in rabid grandma-mode and will show pictures to anyone who’s too polite to decline. Though, it’s better than Bea who keeps trying to set me up with her own granddaughter.”

“Now that doesn’t sound like a half-bad idea.”

“Dating my shift manager’s granddaughter? And here I thought you were a fan of professionalism.”

“No. Dating in general. You should try it. Just a cup of coffee; nothing major. It’s been what? Six months since the divorce?”

“Four, and it’s still being finalized,” Steve stares hard at his beer, drawing a finger down the side to clear off a strip of condensation. “I don’t think I’m ready for that.”

Sam gives up all pretenses to stare pointedly at Peggy’s mini-shrine posted in Tony’s corner. “I can see that.”

“But did you see the Mets beat the Dodgers, 3-0 in the National League playoffs?” Steve clumsily changes the subject, and that’s when Tony realizes how badly the man wants to derail Sam’s suggestion, if he’s willing to throw his beloved Dodgers under the bus.

Sam takes the bait, and Tony groans as he settles in for another mind-numbing evening of baseball talking points.

_Hooray._

* * *

Steve, Tony decides, spends a worrying amount of time in his shitty apartment. Not that Tony doesn’t enjoy the company, but it can’t be nearly as enjoyable for Steve, who has no way of knowing his mattress is enchanted nor of communicating with Tony in any meaningful way had he known, outside of the odd nap. His friends stop by, which breaks up the monotony, but the man needs to get out more.

Like he does in his dreams.

“It’s you again,” Steve says in lieu of a greeting upon seeing Tony once more. It’s sweater weather in London, and Steve is wearing a leather jacket and voluminous blue knobbly-knitted scarf. The temperature inspires a pretty flush along the tips of his ears and across the apples of his cheeks over his nose.

Though the chill is likely psychological given the fact that none of this is real, Tony breathes into his cupped hands to warm them. “What can I say? I don’t scare off easy.”

“You cold?” Steve is already taking off his scarf to hold out to him.

And this is what Tony had been talking about: the self-sacrifice.

When Tony doesn’t accept right away, Steve steps forward to loop it around his exposed neck. It’s wide enough to wrap up around his chin almost to his ears and toasty from Steve’s residual body heat. Tony is grateful if a little annoyed at the gesture.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” he grumbles, even as he bundles it up higher to cover his nose and mouth, muffling further conversation. “Now you’re cold.”

“I’ll live.”

Steve doesn’t have to rub it in.

“So, London, huh?” Tony observes instead, falling into step with Steve as they stroll down the streets together.

“City I called home for seven years and change. I used to dream of Brooklyn when I was first over there. Figure it will take a while to recalibrate. A lot has changed, and I’m still getting used to it.”

“Yeah, would go a lot faster if you made it outside every once in a while. You know, take in the local color.”

“I go outside.”

“For work. That doesn’t count. You need to live a little.”

Steve frowns. “You sound like Sam.”

“Sam is a smart man who knows what he’s talking about,” Tony retorts, side-stepping a couple pedestrians walking past them. The pedestrians always seemed to make way for Steve automatically, but Tony, being inherently non-Steve, still had to watch out and yield. “Look, you know it’s bad when your subconscious is siding with the other guy. You work at a bar _and_ retail. It should be easy to meet new people. Find someone you like or that likes you, let them chat you up, and say yes when they ask you out, or ask them out for a cup of coffee when they sober up.” He has never worked in the service industry, but there had to be some level of interaction, especially between staff and regulars. And just look at Steve: There’s no way the man didn’t have an admirer or ten.

“I’m there to do a job, not flirt.”

“Sounds like an excuse not to move forward.”

“Or a way to not get fired,” he stops in front of a pub. Stepping over the threshold and holding the door open, he looks expectantly back at Tony. “You coming? Best sausages around.”

Tony hasn’t had a drink in ages, and Steve probably couldn’t conjure up the taste of a decent top shelf scotch if his life depended on it, but whatever passes the time. It’s not like Tony really has a choice anyway.

“Sure, if you’re buying,” he says, entering the establishment and noting that the bartender is decidedly not Bucky.

Steve laughs at the poor joke, but leads them to the bar just the same.

“Two bangers and mash, Georgie, and give me a pint of Beaverton,” he orders before turning to Tony, “What are you drinking?”

“Same, I guess.”

“Two pints,” Steve amends, holding up his fingers to indicate the change. The bartender pours them their drinks, sliding them over. “We’ll be sitting at that booth over there.” Steve hooks a thumb at an empty corner booth, then saunters over, where he takes the seat facing outward towards the rest of the establishment and the door, his six backed against a wall. Tony slides in across from him. It reminds him of when he would duck into a diner for a cheeseburger with Happy, who always insisted on an interior corner booth so he could scope out the place like the bodyguard he is.

“I’d like to… apologize for last time,” Steve begins, not quite meeting Tony’s eye. “I hadn’t meant to get so carried away.”

“Yeah well, it happens.”

“Not to me, not usually anyway.” He sounds embarrassed. “It’s harder here, to keep things under wraps.”

“I imagine it would be more difficult to lie to yourself when this world can be anything you want. Your past, or an ideal version of it anyway.” Tony lifts up his glass, clinking it against Steve’s motionless one. “Cheers.” He takes a sip. It’s not bad, as far as beers go. He still would have preferred a good scotch though.

“And this is what? My ideal first date?” Steve looks around, taking in the casual setting and Tony himself.

Tony is uncertain whether he means the pub itself or the company, so he shrugs. “I don’t make the rules; I just work here.”

“I guess I _am_ out of practice,” Steve muses.

“Hey, I resent that. I’m an excellent first date,” Tony argues before dropping his voice, muttering into his glass. “It’s the second date and beyond that I struggle with.”

“On our first date, I took Peggy dancing.”

The pub fades into the background as a dance hall comes into focus. Tony’s eyes are drawn to the center of the floor lit up like a cheesy romantic comedy where Peggy and a copy of Steve sway to the music, her body curved flush into his. He’s whispering something in her ear that must be funny because she pulls back a bit and laughs. Tony turns to look at Steve still sitting across from him, cheek resting on a curled fist as he watches the memory play out with shining eyes and a rueful smile.

Okay, enough of this.

Tony stands to block the spectacle and holds out his hand. “May I have this dance, Cap?”

Steve snaps out of his reverie to focus on the present. “What? Really?”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t mean it,” he says, reaching out further to take Steve by the hand. “Now, let’s cut a rug or whatever it is that you old-people say.”

“I’m younger than you!” Steve protests, but he follows Tony all the same.

“Not in spirit.” And that’s all that counts now that he is most-likely dead.

Tony spins Steve around, one hand slipping behind to settle on the small of Steve’s back while the fingers of the other stay interlaced with Steve’s own as Tony executes a simple dance step.

“I usually lead,” Steve remarks after a moment.

“So do I, but I’m willing to switch up if my partner asks nicely.” Tony steps in, then spins them around, pushing Steve’s hand down his back while moving his own up to rest on Steve’s upper arm. “There. But only because I like you.” And to his surprise, Tony discovers his statement to be true.

The focal point of the room, the spotlight which had formerly been on Peggy and doppelganger-Steve has shifted to center on Tony and current-Steve as the old memory fades into the background then dissipates.

Steve looks down at the other man, his tone betraying uncertainty. “Who are you anyway? Are you really the contrarian inside me?”

Tony smiles wide, his eyes soft. “Honey, I’m anything you want me to be.”

“How about a friend?”

Tony laughs. “Sure, I can do that.”

* * *

“I’m telling you, Steve. The best way to get over someone is to get under someone else.”

Sam brought Chinese for dinner. It is a routine now. Every couple days, Sam stops by after work to order take-out when he can’t coax Steve from his self-imposed hermitage.

“What about that girl at the laundromat you were telling me about.” He snaps his fingers. “Kristen. You said she was cute.”

Steve politely swallows his mouthful of lo mein before speaking. “I’m too busy.”

Sam openly surveys the other man’s depressingly well-lived-in bachelor pad. “I can see that,” he deadpans.

Steve exhales loudly in frustration, leaving his chopsticks sticking out of the to-go container to rub the line of his eyes before he lays out his case: “Look, I’m still trying to rebuild my life here. I haven’t been on a first date in almost nine years. I don’t have a steady job, a decent apartment, or anything like that. What am I going to be able to offer a date?”

Sam gives him a slow once-over, openly ogling his physique. “Your sparkling personality.”

“Don’t be a jerk.”

“Hey man, I know this girl. Shari. She’s a nurse at the VA. Smart, sweet, isn’t looking for anything serious. She just wants a bit of fun.” He aims the business end of his chopsticks at Steve, snapping them for emphasis. “You in?”

“I don’t know, Sam.”

“It’s just dinner, and if it goes well, she has her own place,” he says, pointedly looking at the Steve’s twin bed in the corner. He has a fair point. If Steve brings a date home, Tony is not the most inviting of love nests; though he is well aware that that had been a mark in Tony’s favor when Steve first picked him up off the curb.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Is it okay if I show her your picture?” Sam takes out his phone to scroll through his gallery, stopping on a photo he deems acceptable and flipping it around to show Steve. “I was thinking of this one with Bob’s puppy from when you visited last year. It’s a good photo.”

“Of the dog.” Steve points out skeptically. “I’m kind of looking down and to the side. You can’t even see half my face, man.”

“Trust me. She’s not going to be looking too hard at your face. Women love a man who takes pictures with animals. Makes us seem sensitive and nurturing.”

“I don’t know if this is such a good idea.”

Sam sighs, clicking off his phone. “I’m not saying you have to marry her or that she is definitely the one, but she is _a _one who is available right now, and you need to start somewhere. Shari’s nice. Cute, too.”

“I said I’d think about it,” Steve insists, returning to his takeout box to rummage around for more noodles, avoiding lumps of sautéed cabbage and strings of limp carrots. “That’s not a no; it’s a maybe.”

Still sounds like a no to Tony.

* * *

They’re in Regent’s Park outside of London Zoo, standing in front of the iconic three-tiered pedastal fountain, listening to the loud gurgle of falling water. Tony tosses a penny into the fountain, making a wish out of habit.

“You ever been to Swingers?” he asks Steve. “You seem like the type.”

Tony can see the exact moment Steve’s brain short-circuits then reboots. He thinks he might have even seen the pedestrians around them glitch simultaneously before resuming their normal background activities.

“…Come again?”

Tony smiles. “Mini-golf. You must have heard of it.”

“Are you – are you asking me out on a date?”

“It’s for your own good,” Tony insists. “You’re a little rusty, so think of this – of me – as practice. I promise it’s a purely academic exercise. For science.”

Steve scratches the back of his head. “For science, huh?”

“Yep. Completely platonic. No ulterior motives to see here.”

Tony is such a liar.

“Well, when you put it that way, how can I say no?”

“Exactly. You can’t. Now: windmill or lighthouse course?”

“Dealer’s choice.”

“Windmill, it is,” Tony decides.

Their surroundings dissolve into a whimsical indoor mini-golf course Steve must have seen pictures of once, because while colorful and well-lit with bright green Astroturf, curved stone walls demarcating the different holes, and fake vines climbing up the walls and curling around the prominent windmill in the center, the entire scene is a bit bare and static, reminiscent of when Tony had asked Steve about his father not too long ago.

“You’ve never been here before, have you?” Tony asks before turning to pick up two balls – red and blue – from Bucky working the register as well as two golf clubs from a bin near Hole 1. Tony hands one of each to Steve, who doesn’t approach the register or his estranged friend.

Steve switches out his golf-club for one with a longer shaft, testing his stance for comfort. “Guilty as charged. Always meant to, but… well, mini golf is usually an early-date activity, and Peg and I never made it out to this one because by the time we moved here, we were already married, and then she was gone a lot, so when she’d be in town, we’d always go out to the movies she’d missed or to restaurants she’d been dying to try again, and… I don’t know. Just never made it out here,” he pantomimes a practice swing, finding the length acceptable for his height. “The pictures looked nice, though. I’m glad we came.”

Tony steps up to the first hole and tosses his red ball down. It’s a complicated one with the course snaking back in on itself, taking three right turns to situate the hole behind him. It would require a minimum of two ricochets around the curve at the appropriate angles to sink it for a hole-in-one. If they had been in the real world, Tony would have walked the entire length to figure out the appropriate angles and at least give himself a fighting chance for a hole-in-one, but since real-world physics don’t apply here, he doesn’t bother. Instead, he herds his ball into the small divot on the mat with the head of his club, taking the starting position.

“You are never past the stage of wooing your partner if you want to keep the relationship alive,” he comments, swinging back to hit the ball. Unsurprisingly, it banks off the backboard at an angle but manages to bounce back straight towards Tony in defiance of all physical laws. His statement must have cut Steve deep. Tony retrieves his ball, counting that as one swing.

“Yeah, I really messed up on that one,” Steve tees up next. “You don’t have to rub it in.” He swings, clearing the bend in one bounce but missing the second, ending up a clear three feet from the hole.

“I wasn’t talking about you,” Tony drops his ball back at the start, aims, and swings, but this time, it bounces off the wall and clears the curve to settle closer to the hole than Steve’s first shot. The odds are clearly stacked against Tony, but Tony knows he doesn’t have to win the game to _win_. “Well, not just you. You talk about doing the things she missed, but what about the things you wanted to do?”

“I wanted to make her happy,” Steve is silent as he lightly taps his ball; it lands six inches short of the hole. “But you know… passion isn’t forever. It fades as the relationship moves to a different stage, and that’s not a bad thing.”

“Yeah, but sometimes you get a little too comfortable, and comfortable isn’t bad, but it can lead to taking your partner for granted.” Tony sinks his next shot then writes a ‘3’ in his card for Hole 1 with one of those ridiculously short pencils so common at mini-golf courses. “But then again; what do I know? It’s not like my relationships last long enough for that to happen most of the time.”

“My subconscious is really sticking to the playboy billionaire persona for you, huh?”

“Got to keep you on your toes.”

Steve taps the ball, driving it the rest of the way into the hole. “That’s a three for me as well.”

“Isn’t that strange… Even with you having home-court advantage, we’re tied,” Tony muses.

“We both have home-court advantage.”

“…Right,” Tony stares at the card. “Hey, want to make this interesting?”

“How so?”

“A little wager, Cap,” he suggests. “Winner picks dessert.”

“You’re on.”

Steve beats Tony on Hole 2 by a full two swings, but he must have only seen pictures of the first couple holes, because by Hole 3, Tony is staring at an incongruous pink elephant looming large over them, the head nearly glancing the ceiling. Its long trunk lazily lists to one side than the other, periodically covering a tunnel entrance leading down to the lower level where the hole is situated.

“I don’t remember there being a pink elephant on this course,” Tony remarks, staring at its bulbous cartoon eyes, the whites starting to rust from weather damage, which should be impossible considering Swingers is an indoor establishment.

“Oh, this is the elephant from the Golfland back home when I was a kid.”

_Well, that explains the over-inflated size._

“I used to have trouble with the trunk, but then Bucky told me the trick was to wait until it covered the hole before hitting my ball, because if you wait for it to clear, it’ll be too late.” Steve swings as the trunk hits the equilibrium position then sways past, allowing his ball through. “See?”

“Shouldn’t you not share your secrets? We’re competing against each other,” Tony copies the motion, his ball landing near Steve’s as both play through for a score of ‘2.’

“I just want to give you a fair shake, considering this contest might be _slightly_ tipped in my favor.”

Hole 4 is a red-white-and-blue-banded anthill-shaped monstrosity with a large funnel in the center aiming towards the hole. All of Tony’s swings are alternately too hard, overshooting the hole to roll up the funnel and come out the other side of the anthill, or too soft, not even making it over the first divot and rolling back towards him. He curses – _Language!_ Steve had reprimanded him – and takes the max swing of 6.

“Yeah, this one was always a killer. You have to hit it just right. Bucky and I took a lot of sixes on this,” Steve explains, as he too fails the hole. “Once, I got it in one, and Mr. Barnes got us slushies to celebrate.”

Hole 5 is a long, skinny bridge over a water trap that Tony manages to hit twice, much to his consternation, and once near the hole, his ball swings right. “Oh come on,” Tony complains. “That’s just flagrant cheating.”

“There’s a weird sinkhole near the center that makes it do that. You have to bank around it to get in.”

“Now you tell me.”

“What happened to not sharing secrets?” Steve asks all-too-innocently, so Tony aims his ball to knock Steve’s off-course, missing the hole entirely in the process.

“…Really, Tony?”

“Who said mini-golf can’t be played offensively?” Tony replies, sinking his ball for a final score of ‘5’ against Steve’s ‘6.’

Their last four holes yield the maximum swing count of ‘6’ for both of them, as Steve and Tony declare war, playing to obstruct each other’s balls instead of minimize their own respective swing counts.

And so it happens that after nine holes, Steve wins by one swing despite his score being a personal worst when it came to mini-golf, but both had to admit, it is the most fun they have had on a course in a while.

“Okay, Steve, you won, unfair and completely not-square, but we had a bet, and I am a man of my word. So you get your pick of dessert. The best that dream-money can buy,” Tony declares magnanimously. “I’ll even pay.”

“That’s real generous of you.” Steve smiles wide, and it’s just not fair; the man has dimples and is absolutely adorable.

Tony feels a certain giddiness start to swell in his chest. It’s a feeling from long ago, one he had thought long dead. “What’s the point of being a billionaire if you can’t treat your date to a milkshake once in a while?” he asks, “I mean, how much can one possibly cost? A hundred dollars? Two hundred?”

Steve is about to correct him, but he can see by the twinkle in his eye and the twitching upward spasm of his mouth that Tony is clearly joking.

“How about a banana split? To share. Shouldn’t run you more than fifty bucks,” he suggests.

“Ah, a cheap date then.”

They sit side-by-side in the central lounge area surrounded by vertical bamboo slats, sharing the largest banana split Steve can dream up, containing the traditional toppings of chocolate, pineapple and strawberry with whipped cream and cherries, sans the nuts. It had been a while since Tony had indulged in such a treat, especially since he had recently cut dairy (cheeseburgers didn’t count), but it tastes sweet and nostalgic, reminding him of warm summer nights with his mother when he was still small.

“The taste of home,” Steve declares, and Tony couldn’t agree more.

Looking at Steve, Tony gets an idea. “Want to see a trick?” Before the man can answer, he puts the longest cherry stem in his mouth, ties a neat knot in it with his tongue, then pulls it out from between his teeth.

Steve is amazed. “No way. You’ve got to show me how to do that sometime.”

“No time like the present,” Tony murmurs a moment before he leans in to kiss Steve, parting the seal of his lips to give him a practical demonstration of the necessary movements with his clever tongue, slipping over and tangling with Steve’s own.

Steve drops his spoon into the melted half-finished sundae, his arms encapsulating Tony in a passionate embrace as he returns his romantic fervor, deepening the kiss. Tony’s mind blanks, and he thinks he might have forgotten Step 4 of the process, but distantly, that seems less important than tasting the remains of the ice cream overtop that of _Steve Steve Steve_, who pulls Tony into his lap, pressing their bodies together as he ravishes his mouth.

When they finally break apart, panting, Tony shakily reaches over to take a cherry and plops it in Steve’s mouth, between his parted lips.

“Now… you try.”

* * *

Nat shows up three days later, a couple weeks after Steve and Bucky’s falling out. From Steve’s reaction, he had anticipated her visit, probably expected it sooner if the increasing reappearance of Bucky in the background of his dreamscape said anything.

“Bucky has you coming to check up on me now, too?” Steve inquires, stepping aside to let her in anyway.

“No. He doesn’t even know I’m here. I told him I had another mission.” She walks past him into the kitchenette, to casually lean against the counter, her palms on the edge on either side of her hips and fingers curled underneath.

He frowns as he follows her, stopping at the fridge to peruse its contents. “You know… I get that you can’t tell him about your job, but honesty with personal matters might be the better policy.”

“It’s not a lie.”

“What are you drinking? I have water, and… beer, I guess.”

Sam had brought the beer yesterday, along with a bag of groceries containing the components of easy-to-make meals and a few of Steve’s favorites, which had been suspiciously similar to what Bucky used to bring. When Steve had asked after its provenance, Sam had skirted the issue.

“Hand me one of the beers, and you should take one, too, while you’re at it,” Nat instructs him.

So, he takes out two, opens both, and hands one to her, then takes a swig of his.

Nat crosses her arms, holding the beer by the neck but not drinking. “How long are you two going to punish yourselves like this?” she inquires directly, clearly not being one to pussyfoot around the issue.

“How is he?” Steve asks instead. “Sam brought groceries. That was his doing, wasn’t it?”

“Well, you know Bucky.”

“I told him he didn’t have to keep doing that,” Steve says, his eyes rolling upward and tone verging on annoyance.

She hums, then says (rather incongruously in Tony’s opinion), “Remember when Bucky lost his arm?”

Steve takes another sip. “Yeah, of course. How could I forget?”

“He told me about it, about the incident, about coming home, about how you spent your first leave after it happened in Brooklyn instead of going to the UK to meet Peggy’s parents as planned, and then there were all the phone calls and letters, almost like he was your girl instead.”

“Bucky needed me. Peggy understood,” Steve says defensively.

“And now, you need him, and Bucky is incapable of leaving his platonic life partner to rot,” she says. “It’s a trait you two share in spades.”

“I didn’t lose a limb.”

“No, but it feels like that some days, doesn’t it?” Natasha finally takes a sip of her beer, letting the comment sink in before landing the final strike. “Steve, you are so focused on what you’ve lost, that you don’t see what you have.”

“…I’ll call.”

“Good.” She’s silent for a beat before launching into yet another topic Steve would rather not address. “Now, Sam has been telling me there’s this woman he wants you to meet.”

“Not this again.”

“I’ve also got a few candidates lined up.”

He rubs the line of his closed eyes in disbelief. “…Seriously?”

“Your photo is very convincing. The puppy gets rave reviews.”

Steve groans. “Do they know me and puppy are not a packaged deal? I don’t actually have a dog.”

“Well, you aren’t so bad yourself,” she allows, smiling as she clinks the neck of her beer against Steve’s and finishes it in one draught.

* * *

True to his word, Steve does call Bucky. It’s awkward at first with half-uttered apologies and periods of silence as Tony can only hear half the conversation, but Steve seems to end the call in better spirits than when he started, so he supposes they worked it out.

This is confirmed when Bucky shows up later with a bag of greasy cheeseburgers. Tony practically salivates from his corner as he watches them dig in while sitting on the couch, talking and laughing as if they hadn’t not spoken for two weeks.

“We’re having a Halloween Party next Saturday at our place. You should come,” Bucky says, stealing a couple of Steve’s fries. “We could pull out our old couples costume from a few years back. Mario and Luigi. Classic.”

_Platonic life partners indeed,_ Tony thinks.

“What’s Natasha going as?”

He cants his head to one side in consideration. “The usual. She’s going to be coming as one of our absent friends dressed for Halloween. You know, adopt the other person’s mannerisms and speech patterns. Make me guess which one of them is her.”

“…Pull the sloppy drunk off you when you guess wrong?” Steve adds.

Bucky looks unamused. “That was just the one time, and I regret telling you about it. His soft hands threw me off. How was I supposed to know ol’ Dum Dum Dugan moisturizes? ”

“A mustache like that, and you think the man doesn’t care about his appearance? Something like that takes a lot of maintenance.”

“It is a fantastic mustache,” he rubs his own short facial hair in thought. “Scratchy though. Kissing guys always like that?”

“Sometimes the stubble makes it worse if you aren’t into that sort of thing,” Steve replies frankly before assuaging any insecurities his friend may have about his own stubble. “I’m sure Nat doesn’t mind, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Hm.” Bucky taps the top of his sketchpad atop his coffee table. “You drawing again?”

Steve flips it open to show him, “Just some sketches. Some things I’ve seen around the city on my runs,” he says, narrating the contents every few pages. “Here’s one I did of Sam. And you. There’s Nat. These are my coworkers. Lovely ladies, the both of them.”

Bucky stops him, backtracking a few pages then moving forward a few more, presumably to admire some favorites. “Hey, so… you seeing someone new?”

“No, not yet. Why do you ask?”

Bucky flips over the sketchbook to face Steve, revealing sketch after sketch of Tony himself, in human form. Tony doesn’t know what to say about that.

“You’d tell me if you had a new sugar daddy who faked his own death to slum it with you,” he points at one study of Tony’s face in soft pencils, his eyes crinkled at the corner in unguarded laughter. “Because this looks a lot like that one guy… Stark, right?” He waves the book in front of him like a flag, daring Steve to contradict him.

“Come off it, Buck. Those are just practice sketches.”

Bucky puts it down on his lap to leaf through more pictures as Steve’s fingers practically itch to retrieve it. “You seem to ‘practice’ drawing him a lot. Ooooo look, shirtless pics.”

That does it. Steve snatches the sketchbook from his hands, abruptly closing it shut and putting it back under the table, out of reach.

Bucky bites his lip to keep from smiling at how transparent his friend could be. “So, is that from your fantasies or a memory? Because I don’t recall Stark ever looking like anything other than a rich asshole in any of his appearances, and you gave him bedroom eyes and actual human expressions. I’m pretty sure the man is an android designed by his father to take over the family business.”

“Really? We’re entertaining conspiracy theories now?” Steve grumbles. “And I’ve never even met the guy. When would I have even had the opportunity?”

“I don’t know. Stark used to sell a lot of weapons to the military. Maybe you met him while he was over there. Before Peggy, of course, unless…?”

“I’ve never cheated on Peggy.”

“Who says you cheated? For all I know, Stark got wasted on a business trip and gave everyone at the bar a free show, or much more likely, you watched one of his sex tapes on Pornhub or something,” Bucky points out, much to Tony’s consternation. “He _is_ your type. Physically, anyway. He’s probably a giant asshole in real life.”

“Yeah, probably,” Steve concedes, and Tony is inexplicably crushed.

They sit in companionable silence for a while until Bucky speaks up yet again. “So… I know Nat and Sam have been badgering you a lot about dating, and they have a couple female possibilities lined up, but… maybe that’s not what you want this time around?” He waits, but when Steve is not forthcoming, he continues, “I never told Nat – it’s not my secret to share – and I’m not sure if Sam knows, but if you wanted to maybe try something different, it would be okay. It’s whatever, man. I’m still in your corner.”

“Thanks, Bucky,” Steve replies, visibly relaxing. “For everything. I really mean it. Even when I thought I’d lost everything, I’ve always had you.”

Bucky massages his left shoulder, where the prosthetic meets flesh. “Right back at you, Stevie.”

* * *

That night, Steve and Tony play darts in a bar. Tony had ordered the scotch, and predictably, it’s terrible. Apparently, Steve remembers the liquor tasting of burning and little else, with none of the nuance embodied in a bottle of the good stuff.

Bucky is there as well, and he greets Tony like an old friend. Tony makes an effort. This is a projection of Steve’s best friend after all, so he plays nice and is rewarded with a “Huh, you’re much more pleasant than the media makes you out to be.”

Tony tries not to hold it against him. It isn’t even really Bucky. The real Bucky still knows he’s an asshole.

“Glad I meet your approval, Mrs. Steve’s mom.” Okay, so maybe that was a smidge childish.

“Oooo, I like you,” Bucky takes a pull of his beer before adding, “So, I saw Steve’s sketches of you. Tell me: do you really have a six pack under there?”

“Bucky!” Steve reprimands him, but Bucky (or rather Steve masquerading as his best friend) looks way more interested in the answer than would be normal for a presumably-straight man.

Wordlessly, Tony pulls out his shirt from his pants, undoing the bottom-most buttons to lift it up and show ‘Bucky’ the flat plane of his stomach, compact muscles rippling down. He might not be as large as Steve, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t (didn’t?) work out.

“Huh, so that’s what you’re hiding under the suit,” Bucky remarks, openly staring, while Steve blushes and looks away.

“I showed you mine. I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing your’s,” Tony tells Steve. Of course he’s seen him in various states of undress around the apartment – it’s not like he can help it – but it would be different to have Steve knowingly and willingly show him, even a self-projection within the confines of his own mind.

“Maybe some other time.”

* * *

Steve has been in the bathroom for at least forty minutes by Tony’s calculations. He showered the first ten before the water cut off, and then he just didn’t leave as he usually does. Tony worries that perhaps Steve slipped coming out of the bath and is lying there, slowly bleeding out from a massive head wound. Tony, being the mattress he is, can only sit back, helpless, as Steve lies dying less than ten feet away. The subsequent sound of the sink creaking on and off – God, the walls are paper-thin – allays his fears somewhat, and when Steve emerges, freshly-shaved and hair combed and parted with a little product, he looks good.

Very good.

Suspiciously so.

Tony notes the tan line on his left ring finger as Steve grabs a jacket and pulls on his nice shoes before heading out the door.

Tony isn’t stupid. He knows what a man going out on a date – his first in years – looks like. Tony had half-expected it, but it’s still a sucker punch to his nonexistent gut when he imagines Steve on a date with someone else, holding them close, kissing them, having sex probably – because it’s New York, and people here live fast, and practically every one of Tony’s dates ended up with one of them on their backs by the end of the night. Tony knows it’s unfair to Steve. He knows it could never work out between a ghost and a living, breathing gorgeous human being such as his unwitting bedmate, but he thought perhaps he could keep him to himself a little longer. It had been too long; Tony is desperately lonely, and he likes Steve. If Steve finds someone else, gets married and replaces him with a brand new mattress, he won’t need him anymore, and then what will happen to Tony?

But he is getting ahead of himself. All that is far in the future. In the present, he just has to endure another long night without the human contact to which he had grown accustomed. Consider it practice for the future inevitability of Steve finally moving on.

So imagine his surprise when Steve is only gone for four hours, coming home promptly at ten and crashing on Tony, groaning with abject failure as he buries his face in his pillow then rolls onto his back.

_So… that bad, huh?_ Tony thinks, and a selfish part of him is glad for it then immediately guilty. Steve must have liked his date, but perhaps she (or he) didn’t feel the same way. Steve should really stop hitting up mixers for blind hermits if he wants to improve his chances of success, because the only way someone like Steve struck out is if the other person is both blind and immune to his good-natured personality.

Eventually, Steve gets up, prepares for bed, and settles down on Tony. Alone.

Tony tries not to be too happy about it as he’s sucked into Steve’s dreamscape not too long after. There, he finds Steve awkwardly sitting across from a young woman he calls Shari. Their conversation is painfully stilted and often quiet. At one point, presumably out of desperation for any interaction whatsoever, Steve asks Shari if she likes food because he’s a big fan. Of food.

Tony shouldn’t have worried. The man is a first-date trainwreck. The only way he could make this situation any worse is if he brought up the divorce.

“Peggy used to like food, too… before the divorce. I’m sure she still does, though.”

_Oh, Jesus Christ._ Tony thinks before approaching their table to put Steve out of his misery.

“This is a good news, bad news type of situation,” he starts, looking between the two before directing his attention to Steve.

“…Tony?”

“The bad news is that you are awful at this. Absolutely terrible to an almost impressive degree. I cannot overstate it. I don’t think I’ve ever witnessed a one-man disaster quite on this scale,” Tony continues, crossing his arms with one arm bent up to massage his temple.

“He really is,” Shari agrees, looking relieved and somewhat interested in Tony.

He ignores her to focus on Steve. “But the good news is that this is a dream, and your knight in shining armor – AKA me – is here to save you.”

“Thank God,” she replies, moving to grab her coat.

“Not you, sweet cheeks, though Sam was right about you. You are very attractive – a true delight, I’m sure – but I’m here for the big guy,” Tony hooks a thumb at Steve before turning to address him yet again. “What do you say? You want to get out of here?”

But the man looks conflicted. “Tony, this isn’t a good time. I’m on a date–”

“It’s fine, Steve,” Shari assures him. “You’re a nice guy and all, but I’m not sure you are ready for this.”

“That’s what I keep telling everyone.”

“Still talking to yourself, bud,” Tony interjects.

“I’m always talking to myself here.”

Tony doesn’t correct him. “Look, you can stay here and continue to bore yourself to death and give me a terminal case of second-hand embarrassment, or we can go and do something fun.”

Steve looks from Shari, already one arm threaded through her coat sleeve, then back at Tony earnestly awaiting his response. “…Alright. What do you have in mind?”

“You ever been to Crystal Palace Park?”

* * *

“Now, isn’t this more fun than dinner?” Tony asks, riding on the back of a giant anatomically-incorrect Iguanadon, slowly roaming along the limestone cliffs to lazily chomp on the surrounding foliage like a sloth.

Steve sits atop his own reptilian steed as it dips into the water for a drink. “They are more lively than I remember.”

“We should take these babies over to dinosaur island. The ichthyosaurs lie around like elephant seals in the shallows, and have you seen their heads? That’s always the problem with paleontologists. They shrink-wrap flesh onto fossils when they should be adding at least 30% more bulk to account for muscles and body mass. Have you seen the artistic renditions of what modern animals would look like if we applied the same concept to them? Completely unrecognizable.”

“Huh. I’ve never thought of that before,” Steve muses, his brow taking on a thoughtful expression.

Tony’s Iguanadon attempts to climb a tree, improbably groaning when he snaps it under his mass. “And don’t even get me started on the feathers and striping patterns.”

“You were big into dinosaurs as a child, weren’t you?”

“I was more into robotics myself, but what kid doesn’t like the big and scaly?” Tony replies nonchalantly. “We should head out to see the Megalosaurus. The model here has a weird camel hump and walks on all fours despite being a theropod. I call dibs on front seat,” he slides down from the Iguanadon’s back, holding his hand up to help Steve down as well. “You can ride bitch.”

* * *

Steve starts to go on more dates, usually weekday nights or weekend lunches when he doesn’t have work at either the bar or the art supply store. He comes home most days, but occasionally, he doesn’t come at home at all, stumbling in after 6am to shower and get ready for work. Tony tries to ignore it, still taking Steve out in his dreamscape, sometimes in London, but increasingly in Brooklyn. He sees new people sometimes, and wonders how many of them are Steve’s dates, but he never asks, and Steve doesn’t offer the information, not being one to kiss and tell. That’s fine with Tony; it’s not like he really wants to know anyway.

But then Steve fails to return home for the third night in a single week, and Tony feels compelled to ask.

“Missed you last night,” he says, adjusting his grip before taking a swing of his metal bat, smashing into an old-school printer to feel the satisfying crunch of plastic and electronics. They’re at the Wrecking Club, where for a relatively small fee, you can be your own one-man wrecking crew and go ham on a bunch of outdated items and trash no one wants. It’s Tony’s idea, of course.

Steve stands back while Tony continues to destroy the printer, breaking it down into ever smaller bits. “I had a date.”

Heaving from the exertion, Tony comments, “It must have gone well. Someone slept over.” _Last night, the day before and two days prior to that. _Not that Tony is really counting. He’s just observant. That happens when one’s only lifeline to the outside world goes missing. One tends to notice. He eyes the heavy big screen television in the corner.

“Bernie’s nice. I like her okay.” A woman with long curly dark hair and high chiseled cheekbones appears behind him, dragging a hand seductively across Steve’s shoulders as she passes and giving Tony a wink before she dissipates.

Tony keeps his expression carefully neutral even as he swallows the lump in his throat. Still…

“That’s a ringing endorsement. What’s the matter, Cap? Don’t like nice?”

Steve rolls the grip of the bat in his hands, watching the barrel spin in place. “I just… I don’t feel anything. I tried. I had a really nice time last night, but I just kept waiting for… And it’s not her. It’s not her at all. She’s smart and interesting and beautiful. I like her more than the others, and if I wasn’t so… well, I think I could have fallen for her, but it’s not just her. I don’t think I can feel anything for anyone anymore.” He taps his knuckles against his chest. “There’s nothing left in here to give to anyone. I’m tapped out.”

“I know the feeling,” Tony commiserates. How long had he felt like that, like everything that made him human was carved out long ago, leaving a hollow husk of a man drowning in sex, booze, and the next big invention.

“When things fell apart with Peggy… I- I couldn’t stay,” Steve admits. “Everything in London reminded me of her. The flat. Her friends. Our favorite haunts. Even the goddamn sett paving reminded me how her heels would get caught in the pavement and I would catch her in my arms, and… and I had to get away, so I ran. I ran to the only other home I knew: Brooklyn, Bucky, Nat and Sam. I thought it would be better here, but things are… different. I’ve been away so long and maybe different would be good if I had moved to a completely new place, but I’m here now, and having friends around, it helps, but… It’s still hard. I miss her. I miss being married and being so sure about the future.”

Tony decides to leave the television for Steve, taking aim at an old barrel keg, giving it a satisfying wallop that resonates loud in the concrete room. “Which do you miss more?”

“Huh?”

He turns back to Steve, wiping the sweat from his brow. “Peggy or the idea of Peggy; you know, that feeling of certainty?”

Steve is silent for a bit, his face perplexed and a little offended, so Tony continues, “Don’t get me wrong; it’s obvious you loved her, but… Well, that sort of thing, that stability that relies on other people, it was never for me. It does have a certain appeal, the idea that you never have to be alone again, but sometimes being in a bad relationship is its own form of loneliness.” It had been a long time, and the bite of Sunset’s betrayal no longer stung, but the lessons the experience imparted never truly faded, even after all these years.

“We weren’t that bad together. We had a lot of good times.”

“Mm. See, that’s what people don’t understand. Bad relationships aren’t terrible most of the time. They’re like only 18% terrible – an argument can be made for 20 – but when it’s bad enough, it makes the 82% ranging from acceptable to fantastic not worth it,” Tony says. He shakes out the muscles of his arms, not quite looking at Steve. “That’s why I just don’t bother. I can’t manage not being _at least_ 18% awful to anyone given enough time. Well, except maybe Rhodey, but honey-bear’s straight, so that’s off the table.”

Steve’s tone is biting. “So, that’s your advice then: Give up?”

“No, of course not. I’m a lost cause, but you? You can probably do 5% terrible under the right conditions, depending on how much the other person weights ‘promptly washes dishes when more than one set is available’ in their scoring rubric. 5% is less than most people can do under any circumstances and well within a prospective partner’s tolerances,” Tony rambles on before clarifying, “In laymen’s terms: nobody’s perfect, but you get pretty damn close.”

“Um…”

“That right there? It was a compliment.”

Steve looks dubious. “Thank you?”

“You’re welcome.” Tony steps aside, waving towards the television that he has yet to smash. “Now, if you would be so kind as to do the honors, I think you’ll find this exercise quite therapeutic. Even better than yoga.”

Fluidly, Steve steps forward as he swings back and brings his bat down on the television, crashing into its face in a cacophony of smashed glass. He pulls back, bringing it down again and again as the screen gives way to wire then breaks across the concrete. Steve turns on yet another busted keg, beating deep dents into the sides as they squish like soda cans.

He pauses, panting into the barren room. “You know, you might be right about this.”

“I always am,” Tony says, before taking a swing at an old punching mannequin, his arms feeling the burn when his bat bounces off the hard rubber. “So, when are you going to see Bernie again?”

“Saturday. She’s coming by the bar.”

Tony grunts then turns on a previously-neglected pressed-board desk, bat in hand.


End file.
